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WHY DOES NOT GOD 
INTERVENE? 

AND OTHER QUESTIONS 



FRANK BALLARD 

D.D., M.A., B.Sc. (LbW), F.R.M.S., etc. 

AUTHOR OF 

THE MIRACLES OF UNBELIEF," " HAECKEL'S MONISM FALSE," " THEOMONISM 

TRUE, " " THE TRUE GOD," " CHRISTIAN ESSENTIALS," " DOES IT MATTER 

WHAT A MAN BELIEVES? " " NEW THEOLOGY," "' GUILTY '—A 

REPLY TO ' NOT GUILTY,"' " THE PEOPLE'S RELIGIOUS 

DIFFICULTIES," " ' EDDYISM '—A DELUSION 

AND A SNARE," " DETERMINISM— FALSE 

AND TRUE," ETC. 



SECOND EDITION 



HODDER AND STOUGHTON 

NEW YORK AND LONDON 



L ^»Va 



n \ o \ 



TO MY SON 

ROBERTSON BALLARD 

WITH THE PRAYER 
THAT HE MAY PROVE WORTHY OF HIS 

GREAT NAMESAKE : 

AND MAY BE TRUE TO THE PRINCIPLES 

OUTLINED IN THESE PAGES 



<* 



5* 

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PREFACE 

The questions considered in this volume are but a 
few out of the unnumbered host which have always 
exercised men's minds in regard to religion. Some 
of them are very ancient, others more modern, all 
are such as may be met with anywhere and every- 
where to-day. They all demand fair if not fresh 
consideration in the light of our present knowledge. 
No one needs to be told that Christian faith does not 
consist merely in answered questions. But very 
many who are comfortably housed in the Churches 
do need to be reminded that questions of all kinds 
are agitating, if not preventing, Christian belief, to 
an extent never before known in Christian history. 
And for the three plain reasons, that there are more 
questioners ; there is more ability as well as more 
liberty to question; and there is much more both 
around and within us all which drives men to ques- 
tion what has hitherto been generally accepted. 
The ipse dixit of the priest no longer counts for any- 



vl PREFACE 

thing. Even the authority of the Church is set aside, 
or set at nought. Both these former methods of 
silencing inquiry have had their day and ceased to 
be. The modern world is coming back in religion 
to the standpoint of the greatest Rationalist who 
ever lived, whose claim to be heard and obeyed was 
— "Yea, and why even of yourselves, judge ye not 
what is right ? " Whatever may be the value of 
intuition, simple trust, spiritual experience, upon 
the method endorsed by that question of Jesus, and 
upon no other whatever, turns the future of religion 
for humanity. 

"What is right," is confessedly a great and com- 
plex matter, requiring for its valid consideration all 
that can be learnt from history, science, philosophy, 
criticism, and practical life. No one age can settle 
it for another. Even if adequate answers to all our 
questionings could be fully supplied to-day, they 
would not necessarily suffice for the next genera- 
tion. It is indeed not the fact of the answer, but the 
act of answering which contributes most really to 
moral character, alike in a man and for an age. It 
is worse than useless for believers in these days to 
lament the passing of the "ages of faith," when no 
questions were asked, and no one was put upon his 
mettle to answer them. The cry for the recurrence 



PREFACE vii 

of such a time is childish without being childlike ; 
for childhood, we know well, flourishes best in a 
veritable atmosphere of questions. The sigh for a 
bygone unquestioning spiritual placidity, which 
shall have no difficulties and feel no doubts, but 
simply walk with sweet content "in the old paths," is 
as unworthy as futile. It is as impracticable as to 
desire that this our island shall not be broken up by 
railways, or everywhere intersected by roads and 
by-roads, but remain in the natural simplicity which 
the ancient Britons knew. Such a land might suit 
the naturalist and please the antiquarian, but modern 
populations could not live upon it. 

There is, after all, something better than the 
sweet simplicity of an unquestioning faith, viz. the 
ideal which the Apostle to whom Christianity owes 
most set before the Corinthians — " Stand fast in the 
faith, quit you like men, be strong. Let all you do 
be done in love." A child in arms is truly a beauti- 
ful sight, but woe to the race if its babes do not 
grow into something better and stronger. A man 
who merits the name should be able and willing 
rather to carry others, than be himself everlastingly 
carried. So, in our day, the great need of Church 
and world alike is not more " children " of God — for 
there is a sadly real sense in which we have too 



Vlll 



PREFACE 



many such already. It is rather men and women of 
God who are needed; able first to stand alone, 
and then to help others; evading no honest ques- 
tion ; denying no facts ; shirking no real diffi- 
culty ; neglecting no plain duty; shunning no 
rightful burden. But these cannot be grown 
upon mere doxologies. They are never developed 
by the complacent reiteration of pious platitudes. 
Their souls have to be braced by cold winds of 
difficulty, and their minds kept alert by shocks of 
questioning. Fightings without and fears within 
constitute the atmosphere in which their strength is 
gained. Anguished perplexity of mind and bitter 
disappointment at heart are found in the Geth- 
semane through which they have to pass, before 
honest doubt can issue in strong and potent faith. 
Yet these are they who, more than any others, are 
now wanted for the hastening of that better day 
which any real Gospel must promise humanity. 
A day, that is, when the Father's will shall be done 
on earth as it is in Heaven, by giving every human 
child at least a chance to make this life worth hav- 
ing, and thence another life worth hoping for. 

On the great themes specified, the following pages 
are merely suggestive. Exhaustive treatment of any 
one of them would require the whole volume to 



PREFACE ix 

itself. Some little repetition of main points has been 
unavoidable, in order to make each section complete 
in itself. It is hoped that this will not demand 
large apology. The various discussions do not pro- 
fess to be theological, though theology cannot be 
excluded. They are not even original, for indebted- 
ness to others runs through the whole. Should it 
be asked, as well it may, what then is the use of 
another book on such well-worn themes, if it is 
neither original nor exhaustive, the humble rejoinder 
must be that suggestion may be helpful where com- 
plete solution is impossible. Every such sugges- 
tion, made in good faith, is at least a contribution 
to the growth of the truth which is increasingly 
needed in order to bring about the greatest blessing 
of the greatest number. 

Dr. W. N. Clarke has well said in his recent vol- 
ume on " The Christian Doctrine of God " — a work 
to which no greater praise can be accorded than to 
say that it is on a level with his former " Outline of 
Christian Theology " * — " The moral question of God 
and the world will always remain more or less 

1 With deepest regret I learn, as these pages are passing through 
the press, that this noble Christian teacher has passed from our 
human midst. If my poor words shall serve no other purpose than 
to direct others to the study of his invaluable works, as specified, I 
shall be sufficiently rewarded. 

b 



x PREFACE 

a mystery to men. Short solutions of it have 
abounded. But they are too short and easy." No 
such vain hope as a "short and easy" solution is 
here contemplated. It will more than suffice if only 
some few fellow-questioners are helped, and fellow- 
workers enheartened ; whilst honest doubt is frankly 
met, and the unbelief which does not want to believe 
is ruled out of account. The most accomplished 
theologian is but a feeble groper amidst overwhelm- 
ing immensities, and according to the degree of his 
intellectual honesty he will acknowledge in the end, 

So runs my dream, but what am I ? 

An infant crying in the night, 

An infant crying for the light, 
And with no language but a cry. 

Those who most sincerely believe that Jesus Christ 
is in very deed the much-longed-for " Light of the 
world," will most truly learn from Him genuine 
humility amid their rejoicing, and boundless charity 
along with their well-grounded hope. 

FRANK BALLARD. 

Harrogate, 1912. 



CONTENTS 



CHAPTER I 

PAGE 

Why does not God intervene? .... 3 



CHAPTER II 

Does the mystery of pain contradict the love of 

God? 31 



CHAPTER III 

What is there in God to fear? . . . .67 

CHAPTER IV 
What is it to be saved? 95 

CHAPTER V 
How does the Bible stand to-day? . . .129 

xi 



xii CONTENTS 

CHAPTER VI 

PAGE 

Are the Churches helping the modern apprecia- 
tion of the Bible? 163 

CHAPTER VII 
Is there any hereafter ? . . . . -199 

CHAPTER VIII 

What is the Christian doctrine of immortality? 227 

CHAPTER IX 

What are Christian Churches worth to the 

2 59 



MODERN WORLD ? 



CHAPTER X 

What is the revival most needed in Christen- 
dom ? 305 



WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 



" I remember God and am disquieted."— Psalm lxxvii. 3. 

" Verily Thou art a God that hidest Thyself." — Isaiah xlv. 15. 

" Lord, if Thou hadst been here my brother had not died." 

—John xi. 37. 

" My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me? " 

— Matt, xxvii. 46. 

" These five years have been years of the most ruthless oppression. A 
Russian of the Russians, M. Stolypin has assailed every one of the minor 
races of the empire. The destruction of the Finnish Constitution is but 
one instance, though the most conspicuous and offensive. In Russia 
itself, however, as the revolution subsided, the repression became more 
fierce. The field courts-martial were kept hard at work, and every day 
some score of people were hanged within twenty-four hours of a mock 
trial. Hosts of men and women were sent to Siberia and Arctic Russia by 
mere administrative order without trial, and without even a knowledge of 
their offence. Not merely students and 'intellectuals,' but workmen and 
peasants were dispatched to a living grave, simply because they were 
suspected of ' disturbing ' opinion. The prisons were full to overflowing, 
and their inmates huddled in the corridors and passages were swept away 
by disease. In 1909 the gaols of Russia, constructed to hold only 170,000, 
contained more than 180,000 people." — " Daily News." 

" Without being a sceptic or an agnostic, one may feel that there are 
questions in the world which never will be answered on this side of the 
grave, perhaps not on the other. It was the saying of an old Greek, in 
the very dawn of thought, that men would meet with many surprises when 
they were dead. Perhaps one will be the recollection that, when we were 
here, we thought the ways of Almighty God so easy to argue about." 

— Dean Church. 

" Science seems to me to teach, in the highest and strongest manner, the 
great truth which is embodied in the Christian conception of entire sur- 
render to the will of God. Sit down before fact as a little child, be pre- 
pared to give up every preconceived notion, follow humbly wherever and 
to whatever abysses nature leads, or you shall learn nothing." 

— T. H. Huxley, " Life and Letters ". 



CHAPTER I 

WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 

It is not so long since, at one of our largest railway 
stations, a father in a paroxysm of rage, flung his 
child before the wheels of an incoming train, with 
the ghastly result that all four limbs had to be 
amputated in the discharge of the surgeons' sacred 
duty of preserving life. Whether it would not have 
been more humane to let the poor little life ebb out 
under an anaesthetic, may here be left an open 
question. The unutterable horror of the tragedy 
remains appalling beyond tears, wicked beyond in- 
vective. Yet to say that it is harrowing, is far from 
the whole truth. It is much worse. It is typical. 
It is but a gruesome pointer to all those other 
tragedies of earth which equal it in ghastly quality, 
whilst in quantity they are incalculable. Who of us 
dare face them in all their horrible reality ? Can 
we be surprised that the unbeliever, possessed full 
often of quite as keen a mind and tender a heart as 
the believer, should ask with sincere insistence, — 
Where was the God of love to permit such fiendish 
cruelty to be wrought upon a helpless child ? 
"Would you," he demands, "if you are a father, 
allow one of your children so to treat another ? " 
Then further, whilst our tongues are tied by sad- 
dened perplexity, he bids us not forget all the rest. 
As if we ever could ! Who — in days when news- 
papers live by circulating with utmost haste all earth's 
most dreadful happenings — needs reminding of the 
tragedies that stand out in such lurid pre-eminence? 



4 WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 

How can we dismiss from thought the recent burn- 
ing of the vessel on an American lake, wherein 
hundreds of Sunday School children perished who 
were assembled under the very assurance that God 
loved them every one ? Or is that great country 
ever likely to forget how some of its noblest men 
have died ? Why indeed, they may be forgiven for 
asking, did not God intervene to turn aside the 
bullet that ended the noble work of Abraham 
Lincoln ; or why not protect the scarcely less lofty 
patriotism of Garfield and McKinley ? Or, if we 
go a little farther back in the history of another 
land, and dare to think of Cawnpore, is there an 
Englishman living who does not shudder at mention 
of that name, or who would not certainly have given 
himself and all he had to have averted its indescrib- 
able hell of woe ? Yet it cannot be denied that the 
massacre of St. Bartholomew, in the name of the 
Christian religion, was even worse. Whilst as re- 
gards the quantity and quality of human suffering 
brought about by man's inhumanity to man, even 
that dire event pales before the recollection of the 
bloody persecutions, again and again renewed, by 
which pagan Rome sought to destroy early Chris- 
tianity. As for the immeasurable horrors of the 
wars which have made earth's fairest fields into a 
revolting slaughter-house, nothing need be said, 
because nothing can be said that even approaches to 
the truth. It was most nearly summed up in a word 
by one of the greatest generals, when he declared 
with awful simplicity — "war is hell". 

When all that is here suggested is honestly faced, 
even for the briefest moment, we cannot wonder 
that one of the most thoughtful writers on religion 
in modern light, should speak of the dire total as 
constituting " the great objection " to Christian be- 
lief. " Broadly stated," he says only too truly, " the 



WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 5 

objection is that this world which we know, is a very 
hard world in which to believe in the good God 
whom the Christian doctrine sets forth as the one 
God of all. Experience cries out against the belief. 
Facts condemn it." 1 Of a truth it is easy enough in 
human life to play the gnat or the butterfly, as it is in 
the world of mind to be content with the " topmost 
froth of thought," and in religion to be an " incor- 
rigible optimist " by looking persistently only on the 
sunny side of things. But quotations are not needed 
to remind us that prophets, and seers, and psalmists, 
and apostles, have shown a truer and therefore 
nobler spirit. They have " faced the spectres of the 
mind " without flinching, and have laid them with 
open not with blinded eyes. When everything is 
said, the chief virtue of all is honesty. Be it bright 
or dark, truth is that which must be faced, if man- 
hood, let alone religion, is to be maintained. No 
man can be honest in face of the plain facts of human 
existence without being, sometimes at least, shocked 
beyond expression, and staggered almost to over- 
whelming. 

The problems involved are, indeed, in a very real 
sense, worse for the believer than for the unbeliever. 
What did the Psalmist mean when he groaned aloud 
— " I remember God, and am disquieted " ? The 
general tenor of religion, even in his day, was rather 
that one should be quieted by the thought of a God 
who would take care of the righteous and punish the 
wicked. Yet the Psalmist did but voice the heart- 
wrung cry of myriads since, whose worst difficulties 
have arisen from their belief in God. It is the re- 
membrance of God which constitutes the very core 
of the tragic problem. For as a modern theolo- 
gian has well put it — " Between freedom and fate, 

1 Dr. W. N. Clarke, " The Christian Doctrine of God," p. 431. 



6 WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 

between a personal God and blind chance, between 
faith in prayer and trust to luck, we are bound to 
choose. Only the short-sighted and superficial mind 
can find a resting-place between these two opinions." 
Plainly, if chance and luck rule the universe, there 
can be no shock or difficulty concerning anything 
that happens. For the unexpected is in such case 
necessarily the expected. But faith in God inevit- 
ably brings an expectation of its own. Belief in 
the Divine Fatherhood cannot but compel the ex- 
pectation that God will behave towards men as a 
father should. Our own fatherhood ever begets 
such an expectation from our children. If a father 
be walking with his child beside a river, and the 
little one fall in, every man with a heart would ex- 
pect the father to plunge in to the rescue. Refusal 
would be pronounced inhuman. Still further, if by 
holding the child's hand the father could prevent the 
falling in altogether, should we not all expect him 
so to do ? 

Yet what do we find in actual human life ? On 
the one hand, from the Christian standpoint, we have 
Christ's own emphatic assurance — " the very hairs of 
your head are all numbered " — an unmistakably far- 
reaching figure of speech. On the other hand, we 
are surrounded, buffeted, staggered, overwhelmed, 
with such palpable contradictions to this assurance, 
that we are left practically shorn of its comfort, and 
sometimes hopelessly wrecked on rocks of doubt and 
difficulty. The famous autobiography of Mr. John 
Stuart Mill does but express the dread nemesis of 
faith which has happened to very many, from con- 
templation of the actual facts of human existence. 
It cannot be denied that these facts exhibit instances 
in which every reasonable expectation of what 
omnipotent love would do, both to prevent evil and 
to ensure good, appears to be contradicted. It is 



WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 7 

equally certain that this apparent contradiction must 
and does weigh upon the minds and hearts of men. 
The Psalms are our witness how keenly those who 
believed in God felt it in olden time. It is small 
wonder that in our day the broader outlook, along 
with the intensified sensitiveness of advanced civil- 
ization, should cause the modern man to lose heart 
of hope and make shipwreck of faith, in face of the 
world-wide problem of pain and evil. 

What then can be said from the standpoint of be- 
lief, in unevasive answer to the plain question — Why 
does not God intervene to prevent the evil and bring- 
to pass the good ? At least something must be said. 
" No presentation of the Christian doctrine of God 
can be satisfactory, that does not consider the great 
objection," truly writes Dr. Clarke. For men of 
mind who are warranted in demanding reasons for 
faith, as well as for those who do not wear their 
hearts upon their sleeve but are none the less troubled 
within, some answer must be found, if belief in a 
Heavenly Father is to remain as the distinctive Good 
News of the Christian religion. 

The first step towards any such answer is the 
sharp differentiation in thought of the problem of 
evil from the practically inseparable mystery of pain. 
It is quite impossible to disentangle them in daily 
life, or to keep them long apart in earnest scrutiny. 
But in order to clear the way for certain great con- 
sequences, we may and we must always distinguish 
between the suffering which involves, and that which , 
does not involve, the human will. The former may, 
in general, be termed evil, the latter, pain. Evil, to 
be evil, must be what is known as " moral evil " ; 
i.e. it must and does involve the action of a will dis- 
tinct from the divine will, free enough to act inde- 
pendently of and contrary to the divine. Only such 
definite action, consciously contrary to known right, 



8 WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 

can constitute evil as distinct from pain. Unmea- 
sured confusion of thought and speech is continually 
caused by failing to maintain this distinction. 

The question may indeed be asked, why an omni- 
potent and all-loving God does not intervene in regard 
to both. But the answers which are warranted by 
reason and faith are in each case so different, that 
it is really necessary first to confine attention to the 
former, as being so much the greater that the latter 
becomes small by comparison. The problem of evil 
is, in fact, doubly greater than the mystery of pain. 
For even if men are irreligious enough to care only 
for the latter, on philanthropic lines, it must be 
affirmed, roundly but with tragic truth, that seven- 
tenths of the suffering of humanity is due to moral 
evil. Eliminate this, and earth would be almost a 
Paradise. But until theism is proved irrational, the 
yet deeper mystery remains as to how benevolent 
Omnipotence can create or permit the existence of 
beings capable of thwarting its own unmistakable 
purposes. "We cannot assert," says a modern 
thinker, "in the same breath, the reality of evil and 
the fact of creation by an omnipotent and benevolent 
being." 1 Whether we can assert it or not, two 
things are clear. Evil is here in our midst ; and the 
only God worth thinking of is One who is omnipo- 
tent, omniscient, and benevolent. What we are 
driven then to ask is — Why such a Being, if He ex- 
ists, does not intervene to prevent all the welter of 
human woe which has been known in the past, is 
ever continuing in the present, and shows little sign 
of diminishing for the future, through the wrongful 
exercise of the marvellous powers with which man 
has been endowed. 

(i) If succinctness could be sufficiently clear, the 

1 Mr. St. George Stock, " Hibbert Journal," July, 1904. 



WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 9 

question why, in such cases, does not God intervene, 
may be answered in a word. Because He cannot. 
We may say it with bated breath, for reverence's 
sake ; none the less it is the plain even if it be the 
awful truth. In cases beyond all enumeration it is 
the only explanation, alike of the misery of men and 
the sorrow of God. Unbelief, confessedly, is not con- 
cerned with the latter. But Christian theism is ; 
and can never afford to leave it out' of account. 
Jesus wept, we are told, as He looked upon Jeru- 
salem. Unless His tears were maudlin mockery, 
they signified not only His sorrow but His impotence. 
"How often would I, and ye would not." If, then, 
He truly represents to men the Fatherhood of God, 
divine impotence and divine sorrow in face of most 
human woe, are equally real and inseparable. And 
the reason of both is in the simple fact that men are 
men. Men, not marionettes ; persons, not things ; 
human beings, as distinct from animals. How men 
have become such, does not here concern us. Evolu- 
tion, as the method of creation, no more affects the 
reality of human free agency, than the undoubted 
derivation of each individual from a foetus in embryo 
affects the intelligence of the reader of these pages. 
Nor is it at all required at this juncture, that we 
should enter into the intricacies of what is known 
as the " free will controversy ". Our own conscious- 
ness is sufficient witness that, in Mr. Mallock's words, 
"The individual spirit, though evolved from universal 
spirit, and dependent on it, nevertheless possesses 
an autonomous moral will of its own ". Then the 
" crux of theism " — as he also puts it — is to show " that 
the universal spirit, though producing individual 
spirits under conditions seemingly incompatible with 
anything but the misery of most of them, is never- 
theless consumed with an equal love for all ". l 

1 " Hibbert Journal," April, 1905. 



io WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 

Such a statement of the case is indeed pitifully 
one-sided, and so far false. But for the moment we 
may accept the "seemingly " as sufficient pretext for 
such assumption. We then face all that is real in 
" the misery of most " men, with the plain assertion 
that it constitutes no " crux " at all. For it is always 
in spite of, not because of, the " equal love for all " 
which Christian theism assumes. No emphasis 
can be sufficient to put upon this distinction. Allow- 
ing for the imperfection of inevitable anthropomorph- 
isms, it is enough to say that the helplessness of 
God is the real and valid explanation of His non- 
intervention in most human misery. The usual and 
hackneyed reference to omnipotence is altogether ir- 
relevant. For it never was, is, or will be, the part of 
omnipotence to attempt the unthinkable. Granted 
that men are sufficiently free to be moral, i.e. to know 
right from wrong, and be capable of doing either, 
and it ceases to be in the power of omnipotence to 
prevent the doing of wrong, just as truly as to com- 
pel the doing of right. For compelled right is as 
unthinkable as a prevented free being. Either sug- 
gestion involves flat contradiction in terms. It is 
open to any genuine thinker to ask why moral beings 
should be created. But it is not open to him, or any 
one possessed of reason, to demand that a moral 
being should be " restrained " from evil, for that 
would be tantamount to insisting that a round should 
at the same time be square. 

Take but one common instance out of the terrible 
mass. Mr. W. E. Gladstone was no blatant temper- 
ance orator, but he declared before the highest court 
in this land, with a full sense of his responsibility 
upon him, that " greater calamities are inflicted upon 
mankind by intemperance, than b}^ the three great 
historical scourges, war, pestilence, and famine ". 
Well might he add that this fact is "the measure of 



WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? n 

our discredit and disgrace ". But where discredit 
and disgrace apply, divine intervention is ruled out 
of thought. Disgrace can only attach to a free agent. 
And a free agent cannot be compelled. If a man 
wills to fling away body and soul, life and love, for 
drink, or lust, or greed, God could only preventively 
intervene by destroying his manhood. But such 
intervention would be sheer self-contradiction on 
His part, and this human reason can never have any 
right to expect from the Divine nature. 

(2) If the above be true, logically no further ex- 
planation is called for. If God cannot intervene to 
prevent human evil with its consequent suffering, 
without contradicting Himself, no rational thought 
can insist upon that. But the very fact that it is so, 
merits further consideration. To a really troubled 
mind, such a plea might savour too much of a logic- 
chopping subterfuge. It might also be suggested 
that even if the will of a moral being cannot be con- 
strained, yet after the exercise of that will, loving 
omnipotence might intervene to prevent the dire 
consequences which naturally follow upon evil voli- 
tion. Could not God who, we say, is immanent in 
all nature, have caused the poor child to have fallen 
out of the reach of the engine's pitiless wheels ? In 
view of Abraham Lincoln's nobility of character 
and devotion to justice, could not God easily have 
deflected the murderer's bullet ? Could He not have 
smitten the butchers of Cawnpore with paralysis ? 
Could He not have repeated on behalf of the inno- 
cent Christians thrown to Nero's lions, what is said 
to have happened in the case of Daniel ? In a word, 
could He not alwa} 7 s intervene between a wicked 
will and its natural results of unmerited suffering ? 
Could He not have rescued Jesus from Calvary ? 

To all which, the honest unevasive answer must 
be — Yes, He could. There is nothing unthinkable 



12 WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 

in such intervention. Even if every such interfer- 
ence with the natural consequences of human voli- 
tion definitely involved a miracle, it is only a belated 
science which talks now about the impossibility of 
the miraculous. The question in this case ceases to 
be what omnipotence could do, and becomes rather 
what omniscient benevolence should do. 

Two things at least are clear on the threshold of 
any rational reply : (i) That we are living under a 
regime of law. (ii) That, on the whole, the laws 
which hem us in on every side are working for our 
good. These are plain facts which require no argu- 
ment in their support. The laws of nature — if they 
are laws at all and not mere casual sequences — are 
the manifestations of the will of an all-immanent 
God. That He is also transcendent enough to be 
able to counteract them, should He see good reason 
to do so, may be conceded. But to ordain for high 
and holy purpose that such and such results should 
follow such and such conduct, and then intervene 
perpetually to prevent those very results, would 
again be unmistakable self-contradiction on His 
part, which may, as such, be dismissed from thought. 
God who is always expressing Himself in laws 
cannot rationally be called upon to exhibit Himself 
by contradicting those laws. Whether there may 
ever be special cases — such as "miracles " — in which 
He may, in ways unknown to us, overrule what we 
know as ordinary natural law, for a transcendental 
purpose, may here be left an open question. Such 
exceptions could only confirm the benevolence of 
the rule for all humanity, that we should be under 
law, not chaos, nor caprice. For laws are so de- 
signed and may so be known, appreciated, and 
obeyed, as to ensure the greatest happiness of the 
greatest number. But government by ceaseless 
interferences could yield no rule of conduct, no 



WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 13 

guarantee of good from virtuous living, any more 
than warning of ill from the pursuit of vice. Such 
conditions might constitute an environment suited 
to the lower animals, but could never conduce to 
the advancement of moral beings. If human life is 
to be made worth living, certainly if there is to be 
any prospect whatever of upward evolution, nothing 
is more needed than the solemn reminder of the 
reality and resistlessness of those natural laws 
which serve all men to the uttermost when they 
obey, but ruthlessly punish when they disobey. It 
is absolutely necessary for our very existence, and 
even more so for our highest well-being, that we 
should understand, and if need be learn through 
suffering, that in this universe there is a mightier 
Will than ours. And that this Will is as righteous 
as powerful, as awful as benevolent, and can no 
more be trifled with than turned from its purposes 
of love towards us. God does not, therefore, inter- 
vene between us and the consequences of our voli- 
tions, because there is something for our whole race, 
better than intervention, and that is moral govern- 
ment. 

(3) It is only under moral government from 
which, as the all-prevailing rule, intervention is 
excluded, that the most noble and most precious 
element in our being can be developed, viz. the 
possibility of moral character. On a smaller scale, 
which is none the less true for being homely, we 
see it without room for doubt. Why_.jlQ£3_JlQi__ 
every father intervene to prevent his boy at school 
from being punished when he has done wrong ? 
We need not pause to ask whether any wise and 
benevolent schoolmaster would tolerate such inter- 
vention. Would any true father desire it? We 
know that he would not. And we know why. 
Any intervention between wrongdoing and its 



14 WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 

consequence, would practically reduce right to a 
level with wrong. In so doing it would annihilate 
the educational value of the school for all connected 
with it, besides making character impossible for the 
individual boy. To call such an intervention, there- 
fore, love, would be but to blaspheme. It would be 
hate, not love ; and would bring no blessing, but a 
curse. There ought to be no question that the 
noblest element in human nature is the possibility 
of making moral character. This of necessity in- 
volves the possibility of doing wrong no less than 
right. Whence it cannot but follow that the only 
way of keeping a moral being from the wrong and 
training for the right, is to attach penalty which 
cannot be avoided to the former, and reward which 
cannot be mistaken to the latter. What may be in 
other worlds, we neither know nor need to know. 
In this world, human nature being what it is, the 
truth is too plain to call for discussion, that only by 
means of a moral law which first bids us not be 
deceived — " God is not mocked, whatever a man 
sows that will he also reap " — and then carries 
itself out in unprevented and unpreventable penalty 
when violated, can there be any such upward 
evolution of character as will lift and keep humanity 
above brutality. 

(4) The fullest appreciation of this principle is 
perhaps only derived from taking large views of 
human affairs, and surveying on a broad scale the 
issues involved. That is really the lesson of the 
whole Bible, more especially the Old Testament, 
when rightly understood But there are object 
lessons in overwhelming abundance to substantiate 
it every day we live. The popular notion that a 
world entirely devoid of pain, and without any 
possibility of evil, would be a great improvement 
upon this of which we form part, is but a superficial 



WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 15 

and childish delusion. Its utmost result would be 
a world full of non-moral animals. These might, 
indeed, after their fashion, be happy ; but a century 
of such happiness would not deserve to be compared 
with one hour of the moral triumph which is pos- 
sible to every true man. 

It is often said, with much emphasis, that moral 
evil is a vast and insoluble mystery. But there are 
good reasons for affirming that it is not, after all, 
so great as it seems. The question is ultimately 
simple, viz. is a race of moral beings higher, nobler, 
worthier, or not, than a non-moral race ? If not, 
there is nothing left to discuss. But if it be, then 
the possibility of morals must involve the liberty to 
do wrong as well as right. Prof. Huxley's well- 
known offer, "The only freedom I care about is the 
freedom to do right, the freedom to do wrong I am 
ready to part with on the cheapest terms to any one 
who will take it of me " — would be sheer self-con- 
tradiction if it were serious, as the erudite Professor 
well knew. If, then, to justify real benevolence, 
divine intervention to prevent the natural conse- 
quences of wrongdoing were required in any one 
case, it would be equally so in all. But if in all, 
there is an end of moral government, together with 
all its possibilities of character-development in the 
education of a race. 

The modern Eddyism which so unwarrantably 
calls itself " Christian Science," would settle every 
difficulty by a very simple formula. "God is all; 
and God is good ; therefore all is good. Therefore, 
of course, there is no evil." It would be difficult to 
frame a more misleading statement, or to say which 
is the more false, the premiss or the conclusion. Each 
is hopelessly wrecked upon the rock of fact. As- 
suredly honest observation makes us know, with 
only too tragic sureness, that there is evil in this 



1 6 WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 

world. And undeniable experience also asserts that 
God is not "all," so long as I am I. For God is not 
I, any more than I am God. Yet further ; the true 
assertion that God is good, carries with it no warrant 
whatever for avowing that goodness towards hu- 
manity means always the prevention of suffering. 
Personal experience, no less than world-wide and 
age-long observation, shows unmistakably that suf- 
fering may not only accompany but even be the 
means of the highest and noblest moral character. 

(5) But the very largest scale on which the prob- 
lem of divine non-intervention can be viewed in 
this world, is far from large enough to do justice to 
the truth. The solidarity of this little planet of ours 
with the whole solar system is not more surely an 
axiom of science, than it is a principle of Christian 
philosophy that our moral history is bound up with 
that of the universe at large. There is no small 
danger of a far too narrow terrestrial provincialism, 
when we set ourselves to think of the vast problems 
of divine government. If God be God — the only 
God worth thinking of, according to Christian 
theism — He is the same throughout the hundred 
million suns to which astronomy points, whose dis- 
tances from us make our reason reel, as in our earthly 
midst. The moral law which rests ultimately on 
His holy will, must be everywhere and evermore the 
same, whatever enlargements or modifications of 
natural law may be possible under conditions un- 
known to us. This world's order, therefore, alone, 
can never give us the truly complete view of the 
divine government. That which seems to us in the 
dim light of this terrestrial speck a contradiction to 
divine benevolence, may well, in fuller light of the 
universe of suns, be seen to be a necessary part of 
a larger order as far beyond our present powers to 
apprehend, let alone criticize, as the complicated 



WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 17 

extent of some vast modern business is beyond those 
of its owner's little child. The very least that can 
be said, on rational equally with religious grounds, 
is that in this case suspense of judgment must ever 
befit us, rather than hasty and sweeping condem- 
nation. The old seer's words take on to-day an 
emphasis of which he never dreamed— " Lo these 
are but the outskirts of His ways ; and how small a 
whisper do we hear of Him. But the thunder of 
His power who can understand." 

(6) In the end, however, it must be frankly ac- 
knowledged that the question why does not God 
intervene to prevent wrongdoing or its conse- 
quences, becomes an individual problem. We talk 
of crowds, and masses, and the race, but from the 
standpoint of sin and suffering there are no such 
things. A sinning crowd is as unthinkable as a 
suffering race. For good or ill, for weal or woe, it 
is irresistibly appointed to human beings to live 
apart. To each man, each woman, each child, there 
is a world of self-consciousness as absolutely distinct 
from all other as real in itself. The planets that 
compose our solar system are not more discrete, 
than is the whole experience of a father from that 
of his child, or of a friend from that of his friend. 
Husband and wife, brother and sister, lover and 
beloved, may embody the very closest of earthly 
relationships. But they are separate units of con- 
sciousness which never fuse, nor ever really enter 
into each other's world. " Every heart knoweth its 
own bitterness, and a stranger intermeddleth not 
with its joys." Never were truer words uttered 
either by poet or philosopher. It is here that all 
questions relating to the interposition or non-inter- 
position of providence find us most keenly. It is 
here that " the providence of interventions " comforts 
us one moment, only to crush us the next. But as 



18 WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 

we all know that painful experience is likely to be 
more intensely felt and longer remembered than 
pleasurable, it is the more necessary to point out 
that besides the acknowledged inexplicableness of 
some individual cases, there is a real element of 
inspiration even in the providence of non-interven- 
tions. At first glance it may well seem otherwise. 
The truth that " God is no respecter of persons," 
has a tragically bewildering side to it. In well- 
chosen words the late Dr. W. N. Clarke thus 
expressed it : — 

" Endeavours to interpret life as under a pro- 
vidence of interventions do not satisfy the hope 
that has been built upon them. It does not 
prove to be true that occurrences can be relied 
upon to accord with the character of those whom 
they affect. Taking the world through, one 
man is not safer than another from lightning or 
disease, except as intelligent precaution renders 
him so. Both the equalities and the inequal- 
ities of life refuse to be classified in terms of 
moral character. Many a heart has been well- 
nigh broken in coming to the point of making 
the acknowledgment, but at last it has to be 
acknowledged that the doctrine of a protective 
and punitive providence does not correspond to 
the facts of life. Nothing but the most flagrant 
injustice is the result, if we attempt to explain 
the misfortunes of life as punitive. The theory 
does not work." 

The classical comment upon this true protest is, 
of course, the book of Job. But no commentary is 
needed, for we all see it and feel it. Jesus Himself 
acknowledged it in regard to those "on whom the 
tower in Siloam fell," as well as the Galileans who 
were Pilate's victims. It is staggering, overwhelm- 



WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 19 

ing beyond all expression, to remember that each and 
every wife and mother in Cawnpore's awful hell of 
carnage, possessed an individual separate conscious- 
ness of suffering which could not possibly be assigned 
as punishment for wrong. To call to mind the inno- 
cence of every man and woman and child savagely 
despatched in St. Bartholomew's infernal slaughter, 
to say nothing of other religious persecutions, blinds 
our eyes and crushes our hearts. 

Yet if for a moment we can waive the horror of it 
all, nothing whatever is left to disprove the counter 
truth to that enunciated above. If God be no re- r 
specter of persons, it is only and truly because He 
is the respecter of all persons. Upon this Jesus put 
His utmost emphasis, making it as weighty as pos- 
sible by comparison with sheep, and sparrows, and 
lilies. The providence of non-interventions which 
seems so cruelly to ignore the preciousness of the in- 
dividuality of the few in whom we are interested, is 
really all the time solemnly affirming the preciousness 
of individuality throughout the human race. For 
the laws which govern human lives without excep- 
tions or interference, are all of them the expression 
of the care of God for every one. In that care, so 
far as natural laws are concerned, the pauper has an 
equal share with the king; the life and health of 
every child in the slums is as much an object of 
solicitude, on the part of an all-immanent God, as 
that of any prince. Were it not for the interference 
of human selfishness, all there is in the laws of 
nature that makes for health and happiness, would 
always be at the service of every ignorant rustic, as 
utterly as of the most accomplished man of science. 
Thus, whilst providence by interposition would re- 
spect the few, government by law respects all. The 
magnanimity of God is always in evidence, as Jesus 
said, in the sun which shines "on the evil as well as 



20 WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 

on the good," and the rain which falls alike "on the 
just and on the unjust ". Human individuality is 
thus impartially consecrated by the laws which treat 
all men alike ; whilst occasional intervention would 
but spoil some at the expense of all the rest. But 
as favouritism in a family tends to discord and de- 
pression, whilst the love which treats all with equal 
favour, in so doing puts highest value upon each, so 
under moral government by means of natural law, 
has every man, simply as man, the right to think of 
himself, apart from any other, as the genuine object 
of divine sympathy and loving solicitude. 

Yet who does not know that it is one thing in our 
calmer, painless moments, to think carefully and 
logically, whilst it is quite another thing when un- 
expected tragedy shocks us into feeling deeply and 
bitterly. It is only too true in regard to the doctrine 
of an intervening Providence that "if we have 
found a case that seems perfectly to prove the doc- 
trine, the next hour may bring us one that just as 
clearly disproves it ". For every sincere and 
sensitive mind there are still, as there always have 
been, cases of individual innocent suffering, unde- 
served calamity, premature death of such as were 
undoubtedly most needed — with the perpetuation 
of the lives of useless imbeciles or healthy villains — 
which bring us to the same verge of despair as 
the Psalmist, when he cried "As for me, my feet 
were almost gone, my steps had well-nigh slipped ". 1 
The contradiction to all that sincere belief had led us 
to expect has been so apparently ruthless, that we 
have felt again the ancient anguish — "Will the Lord 
cast off for ever ? Is His mercy clean gone for ever ? 
Doth His promise fail for evermore? Hath God 
forgotten to be gracious ? " No Christian man or 

1 Cf. the whole of Psalm LXXIII. 



WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 21 

woman has probably lived to middle age without 
becoming closely acquainted with instances of in- 
dividual pain and loss, calamity and trouble, suffer- 
ing and death, for which no honest explanation 
whatever on moral lines could be suggested. Time 
is often the only healer of such mysteries. They 
baffle all our thought, and make our tenderest words 
of sympathy seem mockery. In such darkness that 
can be felt, many of these life tragedies must be left. 
Here and now we can do nothing with them, save 
imitate the wisest part of the attempt which Job's 
friends made to comfort him, when "they sat down 
with him upon the ground seven days and seven 
nights, and none spake a word to him, for they saw 
that his grief was very great " 

Lest, however, we should be tempted, like Job's 
poor overwrought wife, out of the frailty of our 
nature to give utterance to bitter and foolish words, 
we must remind ourselves that even in these cases, 
where the mystery of triumphant wrong or innocent 
suffering seems utterly inexplicable, it is far too 
soon for us to pronounce final judgment. There is 
always a double future to be faced, alike for the 
individual and for the race. However dramatic the 
representation of the close of Job's ordeal may be, 
when we are told that " the Lord blessed the latter 
end of Job more than his beginning," it points 
vividly to the undeniable truth that, in myriads of 
cases, calamity which at the time it seemed as if God 
ought for sheer pity's sake to have averted, has 
become the starting-point of a greatly needed redemp- 
tion. The accompanying suffering has issued in a 
new life, with a nobler character, whose influence 
for good has been measureless. Untold numbers of 
men and women have come to trace their real en- 
noblement back to a painful fall. No mystery of un- 
prevented wrong or unrewarded right simply begins 



22 WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 

and ends with its occurrence. Wise parents do 
many things to their children which to the dawning 
intelligence must seem to be the very opposite of 
love, but no explanation is then possible. Only later 
years can show that it was real love which adminis- 
tered bitter medicine, refused too many sweets, took 
away dangerous toys, imposed difficult tasks, and 
actually sent away from home joys and comforts to 
the plain fare and hard discipline of a boarding 
school. So, on the larger scale of ordinary human 
life, myriads of men have lived to echo Charles 
Kingsley's words of sympathy to his friend concern- 
ing his own " early Gethsemane ". " I have already 
been through that ordeal which seems to threaten 
you, and my experience may be valuable to you. 
God knows how valuable it was to me, and that I 
rank that period of misery as the most priceless 
passage of my whole existence." 

Even in those tragedies where death, violent or 
premature, puts an end to all things human, Christ- 
ian philosophy does not permit us to lose all hope, 
or falter in the assurance that — 

The love of God is broader 

Than the measures of man's mind ; 

And the heart of the Eternal 
Is most wonderfully kind. 

The passing together into the unseen, of the murderer 
and his victim, the sweet young life to which our 
hearts so desperately cling, with some hoary villain 
whom we cannot but be glad to miss, does not 
mean that they are all simply lost in oblivion, or 
indiscriminately engulfed in a moral chaos. 

"God changes never. In that unseen realm 
of life He is for ever the same as here, or rather, 
to express the eternal truth more worthily, in 
this little world He is the same that He for ever is 



WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 23 

in the infinite realms of being — the lover of souls 
and the enemy of sin. We are not able to trace 
out our hopes to their fulfilment, or our fears to 
their extinction, but as Christians we are 
entitled to leave the problem of evil in the hands 
of God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, 
trusting Him that wherever sin has abounded, 
grace will much more abound." 1 

As to the myriads — for such they are — to whom 
the old pathetic saying applies, "Whom the gods 
love die young," whether the half-hidden pagan 
suggestion that the "love" consists in what they 
here escape, be more or less true, the Christian as- 
surance is that they do but pass from a chilly dawn 
to a brighter noon, that the loss is ours not theirs. 
When our oft crude and childish notions of heaven 
are dismissed to their deserved oblivion, there re- 
mains a prospect of life so much more rich and full 
than this, as to warrant entirely the optimism of the 
Apostle when, out of the midst of sufferings which 
God did not intervene to prevent or lessen, he wrote 
to his fellow-sufferers and fellow-candidates for 
martyrdom : " I am utterly convinced that the suffer- 
ings of this present time are not worthy to be com- 
pared with the glory which shall be revealed in our 
case ". With such an assurance, resting as it does 
upon Christ's own yet deeper, tenderer, all-compre- 
hensive words, we must, as well we may, be con- 
tent, until, in the light that never was on sea or land, 
we see no longer " in a mirror and are puzzled," but 
face to face. 

Even now, when on the broadest scale, dismissing 
alike the far far future and our nearest circles of 
relationship, we think of mankind at large and the 
present conflict 'twixt good and ill which seems so 

1 Dr. W. N. Clarke, « Christian Doctrine of God," p. 462. 



24 WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 

tragic, there is no ground whatever for fear that 
Armageddon may issue in Pandemonium. Rather 
is there every reason for endorsing a conditional 
optimism. All the woes and wrongs of our modern 
civilization cannot suppress the conviction that 
humanity is evolving upwards and working out the 
beast. The suggestion of evolution is, indeed, vast 
and complex, in the moral even more than in the 
physical realm. To appreciate it is to appreciate a 
landscape rather than a blade of grass. We must 
learn not only to take large views, but to be patient 
in so doing. The results most to be desired cannot 
possibly come in a day. If, as our men of science 
tell us, it took a hundred millions of years, or more, 
to prepare this terrestrial ball for human residence, 
what are a few thousand years as the school-time of 
the wondrous yet perverse creature who finally 
emerged from the preceding animalhood, into a 
moral liberty which omnipotence itself cannot compel 
to take the upward way ? 

This at least on the smaller scale we know, that 
no one short and easy lesson, learned at school, will 
ever make a lad a scholar, or a gentleman. Such a 
result can only be brought to pass through the sum 
total of all the pains that all his lessons, then — 
and their after-continuance — have ever cost him ; 
and the teacher who determined to save his pupils 
from all such pains, would be their greatest enemy. 
Rather, because he respects and loves them, he does 
not intervene to mitigate their tasks, or prevent 
their punishments, or rid them of conflict, for in 
the conflicts and the difficulties and the discipline 
is disguised their greatest benediction. So on the 
world scale, that the divine method of non-inter- 
vention is neither a failure nor evidence that God 
has forgotten humanity, may surely be proved even 
now by appeal to fact. For whatever be the future's 



WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 25 

promise of better things, already, beyond all con- 
troversy, the mystery of good, in the moral no less 
than in the non-moral realm, is immeasurably greater 
than the mystery of evil. To this every civilized 
country bears abundant witness, and the rapidity 
with which the whole world is becoming cosmo- 
politan promises an end ere long to all the bygone 
miseries of savagery. All bright estimates of the 
future are, of course, definitely conditional. The 
certainty is that the better day, when sin, and shame, 
and war, and strife, and cruelty, and poverty will 
cease, will not be brought to pass by a providence 
of special interventions, but by that co-operation of 
man with God wherein natural law is recognized as 
His voice, and obeyed as the assurance of His loving 
kindness. The exhortation of an Apostle to the 
Philippians of old comes thus to bear an ever- 
widening significance, nor can all the science and 
philosophy of to-day combine to utter a word of 
greater wisdom or more actual comfort — "Work out 
your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it 
is God who is working in you both to will and to 
work for His good pleasure ". 

When all has been thought and said upon the 
complex problems here considered, the final note 
must be one of tender sympathy no less than of 
patient hope. There are so many cases in which 
the great world-conflict is lost in the distance, 
blotted out of vision by some keen personal sorrow, 
or bereavement, or disappointment, or suffering, or 
calamity, which becomes greatest of all through 
being nearest. " Lord if thou hadst been here, my 
brother had not died " — is a typical outcry from many 
a baffled mind and troubled heart. " My brother," 
in such a case, becomes more than all humanity. 
Argue as we may, we cannot stifle the soul's pathetic 
murmuring — " If God were a loving Father, would 



26 WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 

He have allowed that enemy to do me this uncalled- 
for injury ? — that friend whom I loved and trusted to 
the uttermost, to turn upon me with cruel treachery ? 
Why did He not rebuke the pitiless fever in which 
our darling was burnt to death ? Why not prevent 
the miserable accident that robbed a whole family 
of its breadwinner and broke a true and tender 
woman's heart ? Oh ! who will answer for us these 
wails that never cease ? And echo answers, who ? 
Well may modern agnosticism ask, by the mouth 
of an able representative — "Is there no consolation 
in religion or philosophy to support us in the day 
of trial and in the hour of death ? " But the reply 
is as hopeless as honest — " Alas, if we take away the 
promises of Christianity, there is none at all " '.* Philip's 
pathetic plea has gathered unmeasured intensity 
through the intervening ages. " Lord, show us the 
Father and it suffices us." To that there is one, 
though only one valid reply. " Have I been so long 
time with you, and yet hast thou not known Me ? 
He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father." To 
the doctrine and example of Jesus the human mind 
and heart are driven back, when all other solace 
fails. And worthily so, for never on earth has there 
been such a personality, never such a doctrine, never 
such a tragedy, never such a triumph, as His. 

The quibble to-day about the historicity of Jesus, 
is childish, in face of facts. It does not merit the 
serious and crushing replies which it has called 
forth. The only question that really calls for answer 
is as to the significance of Jesus for a perplexed and 
sorrowing humanity. Amid the glare of the modern 
knowledge to which nothing is sacred, with all the 
burden of our world-cares upon us, and with our 
secret heart-sorrows gnawing within, we yet have 

1 Mrs. F. Petersen, " Hibbert Journal," April, 1908. Italics hers. 



WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 27 

His assurance concerning the Fatherhood — " If it 
were not so I would have told you " — and His ex- 
ample. They are blessed for whom His words 
suffice. But for all others this at least is true, that 
if there were ever a case in which the human mind 
and heart unite to affirm that God ought to have 
intervened, to prevent the world's worst murder, it 
was at Calvary. Yet from out that darkness there 
issued humanity's bitterest cry — " My God, my God, 
why hast thou forsaken me ? " And to that cry 
there came no answering miracle of deliverance. 
The soldier executioners were not smitten with 
paralysis ; the reviling scribes and Pharisees were 
not stricken dumb. God did not intervene. If He 
had done, what would have been the condition of 
the world to-day? We cannot tell. But this we 
know, from the lips of noble unbelief as emphatically 
as from the hearts of believers, that that non-inter- 
vention has been the world's greatest benediction. 
No failure of the Christian Church, from the begin- 
ning until now, can alter the fact that the cross of 
Jesus Christ has been and still is the mightiest in- 
fluence for the highest good amongst the most potent 
nations on earth. His ideal and His example abide, 
whatever becomes of shibboleths and organizations. 
To Him, after the bitter pain freely borne for love's 
sake, there came the peace that passes understanding 
— "Father, into Thy hands I commend my spirit". 
And from such peace He passed on to the triumph 
of that actual resurrection which is, after all the 
hopes and fears of the ages and all the anxious 
probings and peerings of present-day science, our 
surest guarantee and worthiest pledge that death is 
but the gate of life. 

We have all to face life as we find it. At any 
moment there may break upon any of us an avalanche 
of unexpected tragedy. At some moment, whether 



28 WHY DOES NOT GOD INTERVENE? 

late or soon, there must come the hour when the 
strongest will bow in helplessness at the call of death. 
Christianity holds out no promise of miraculous 
deliverance from either. The Gospel does not bid 
us expect that God will intervene. " It is enough 
for the servant that he be as his Lord." To the 
most sincere and devoted disciple there may come 
the time when all other hope and comfort are gone, 
and only Christ is left. But — " only " ? Was it not 
one who had manfully endured all the mystery of 
non-prevented suffering, and faced without flinching 
the certainty of martyrdom, with neither hope nor 
prayer for divine intervention, who deliberately de- 
clared that "in all these things — tribulation, anguish, 
persecution, famine, nakedness, peril, sword — we 
are more than conquerors through Him that loved 
us". It was no mere gush of pious exaltation. It 
was a true word, whose truth remains and will re- 
main until earth's last tragedy is over, and all the 
shadows of our present life are lost in the light of 
the Eternal Love. 



DOES THE MYSTERY OF PAIN DISPROVE 
THE LOVE OF GOD? 



" The notions of the struggle for existence and the survival of the fittest 
have been too commonly taken to mean that life in the animal world is 
one tragic series of ruthless single combats ; that every man's hand was 
and ever must be against the hand of every man , and every beast's tooth 
and claw against the tooth and claw of every beast. But if we read 
Darwin's ' Descent of Man ' and Prince Kropotkin's ' Mutual Aid among 
Animals ' and Winwood Reade's ' Martyrdom of Man ' — and Wallace's 
' Darwinism ' and ' World of Life ' — we shall find that the law of natural 
selection does not favour any such horrible conclusion." 

— Mr. R. Blatchford, " Not Guilty," p. 41. 

" The ideal of evolution is thus no gladiator's show, but an Eden ; and 

though competition can never be wholly eliminated — the line of progress 

is no straight line but at most an asymptote — it is much for our pure 

natural history to see no longer struggle but love, as creation's final law." 

— " Evolution," by Profs. J. A. Thomson and P. Geddes. 

" Our whole tendency to transfer our sensations of pain to all other 
animals is grossly misleading. The probability is that there is as great a 
gap between man and the lower animals in sensitiveness to pain, as there 
is in their intellectual and moral faculties. The widespread idea of 
the cruelty of nature is almost wholly imaginary. It rests on the false 
assumption that the sensations of the lower animals are necessarily equal 
to our own, and takes no account whatever of these fundamental principles 
of evolution which almost all the critics profess to accept. Hence the 
ludicrously exaggerated view adopted by men of eminence and usually of 
such calm judgment, like Huxley — a view almost as far removed from 
fact or science as the purely imaginary and humanitarian dogma of the 
poet — 

' The poor beetle that we tread upon, 

In corporal sufferance finds a pang as great 

As when a giant dies '. 

Whatever the giant may feel, if the theory of evolution is true, the ' poor 
beetle ' certainly feels an almost irreducible minimum of pain — probably 
none at all." —Dr. A. R. Wallace, " The World of Life ". 

" The pleasures of each generation evaporate in air ; it is their pains 
that increase the spiritual momentum of the world." 

— Dr. Illingworth, in "Lux Mundi". 

" The doubts of many as to the origin of pain are not unreasonable, but 
a full consideration of the whole subject will show clearly that the gain 
far outweighs the loss. On the sensitiveness of animals to pain, depends 
their very existence. To drown a pain, to obtund the parts so that no 
pain is felt, is to throw away the warning which the pain has given." 

— " The Lancet." 

" I cannot tell you what is the meaning of a scheme far beyond human 
comprehension. But I know it is safe to trust in my sweetheart Nature, 
and feel certain she will never mislead those who do." 

— Mr. M. Blatchford in the " Clarion ". 



3i 



CHAPTER II 

DOES THE MYSTERY OF PAIN DISPROVE 
THE LOVE OF GOD ? 

Of all objections brought against Christian faith, 
those which are based upon the mystery of pain 
have ever been the most popular and most effective. 
Nothing is so easy as to conjure up instances of 
tragedy from history, from nature, from personal 
observation. Nothing is so potent as an appeal to 
the feelings by means of the imagination. It is the 
first outcry of the tyro in his anti-Christian declama- 
tion. It is the last sigh of the man of science or of 
letters, who pathetically declares that he would be- 
lieve if he could. It is, almost everywhere, an ever- 
troubling perplexity to thoughtful believers. " I am 
only one " — says an eminent and genial Professor 
of Biblical exegesis in a Christian College — "out of 
many, for whom the problem of pain constitutes the 
most powerful objection to a theism adequate to our 
deepest needs. This is of all problems the most 
baffling to many who wish to accept a theistic view 
of the universe. Even sin and death are mysteries 
less oppressive and impenetrable. If sin is a darker 
evil, pain is the more obscure." 1 Nothing would be 
easier than to fill whole pages with lurid extracts 
from the writings of unbelievers, who have vied 
with each other in heaping denunciations upon the 

1 Prof. A. S. Peake, M.A., D.D., "The Problem of Suffering in 
the Old Testament," p. 137. 



32 DOES THE MYSTERY OF PAIN 

Christian doctrine of Providence and a Heavenly 
Father. x 

Most of these, we may readily own, are sincere, 
and they are so far true as to find only too real an 
echo in many a Christian heart ; whilst they must 
generally be accepted as, at least, pointers to a prob- 
lem of the utmost gravit}\ As such they may be 
welcomed ; for a fool's paradise is assuredly no part 
of the Christian ideal. The way of blind-eyed, 
shallow-hearted, sentimental optimism, is for ever 
barred to the genuine believer. Rather is he bidden 
to "prove all things, "and only " hold fast that which is 
good," with " whatsoever things are true ". Whilst, 
therefore, we do not hesitate to acknowledge the 
seriousness of the difficulty suggested, and make 
here no pretence of finally disposing of it, we may 
yet show cause for protest against the sweeping 
assumptions and wholesale assertions of not a few 
anti-Christian writers and orators. They have no 
monopoly of truth, any more than of sensitiveness 
or sincerity. The question of this section which 
they so oracularly answer in the affirmative, we 
venture, with equal candour and vigour, to answer 
in the negative. Whether the Christian believer 
can solve all the harrowing perplexities which attach 

1 Perhaps one may suffice for many. Says Richard Jefferies, 
a How can I adequately express my contempt for the assertion that 
all things occur for the best, for a wise and beneficent end ? It is 
the most utter falsehood and a crime against the human race. 
Human suffering is so great, so endless, so awful, that I can hardly 
write of it. The whole and the worst the worst pessimist can say, is far 
beneath the least particle of the truth, so immense is the misery of man." 

Whilst as to the animal world even Huxley — usually a calm and 
judicial observer — on one occasion so far allowed his unscientific im- 
agination to run away with him as to write, " Since thousands of 
times a minute, were our ears only sharp enough, we should hear the 
sighs and groans of pain like those heard by Dante at the gate of 
hell, the world cannot be governed by what we call benevolence ". 



DISPROVE THE LOVE OF GOD? 33 

to individual cases or not, he is warranted by facts 
in his affirmation that the mystery of pain does not 
contradict, let alone disprove, the love of God as re- 
vealed in Jesus Christ. 

In brief preliminary summary it is well to point 
out that good and thoughtful men of all religions, 
and in all ages, have felt the seriousness of the ques- 
tions involved. Nothing can really be added by 
modern expletives, to the simple-minded but deep- 
hearted expressions in which the ancient Psalmists 
clothed their bewilderment at the prosperity of the 
wicked and the calamities of the righteous. Nor can 
the exaggerated plaints of a Jefferies and a Huxley 
combined, do more justice to life's tragic side than 
the tender yet dignified acknowledgment of the 
Apostle Paul, "We know that the whole of creation 
is groaning together as in the pains of childbirth until 
this hour ". Christian theism feels the painfulness of 
pain, and sees the seeming contradiction to universal 
benevolence in the scheme of things, quite as 
honestly and tenderly as the most cynical agnosti- 
cism or raucous secularism. 

Moreover, Christian thinkers have ever faced the 
problems alleged with quite as much knowledge and 
candour as any anti-Christian propaganda can show. 
Their acquaintance with facts and employment of 
principles have been quite as scientific and philoso- 
phical as unbelief has ever displayed. Nor is it 
enough to say that their conclusions have been de- 
finitely more encouraging in the present, and hopeful 
for the future. It is rather, in plain truth, a question 
of all or none. Whatever may yet be the demands 
upon our faith and patience, in face of the dark prob- 
lems of our present existence, if the Christian solu- 
tion be shown to be untrustworthy, there is no other. 
Nothing in that case is left us but old Omar Khay- 
yam's pessimism : — 

3 



34 DOES THE MYSTERY OF PAIN 

Into this Universe, and why not knowing, 
Nor whence, like Water willy-nilly flowing ; 
And out of it, as Wind along the Waste, 
I know not whither, willy-nilly blowing. 

What, without asking, hither hurried whence ? 
And, without asking, whither hurried hence ! 

Another and another Cup to drown 
The Memory of this impertinence ! 

Orphans of nothing, sports of chance, puppets of 
necessity, marionettes of circumstance, coming no 
whence and going no whither, yet possessed as in- 
alienably as uselessly of faculties which cannot but 
cause us to feel, and ceaselessly demand to know — 
such we must deem ourselves to be, if the Christian 
hope is denied us. Of man in that case it must be 
for ever true that he is — 

A monster, then, a dream, 
A discord. Dragons of the prime 
That tear each other in their slime, 
Were mellow music matched with him. 

In face of such an alternative, the human heart may 
well demand sufficient reason before consenting, at 
the behest of unbelief, to jettison its present comfort 
and future hope. 

The supreme doctrine of Christianity is un- 
doubtedly the love of the Divine Fatherhood. With 
that love, real, impartial, universal, eternal, the 
Christian religion stands or falls. It does not pro- 
fess to be a deduction from nature, but a revelation 
in Jesus Christ. Much confusion sometimes arises 
and much energy, both of attack and of defence, is 
wasted, from the ignoring or forgetting of this plain 
principle. We shall presently see that nature is not 
the mere charnel house, or bloody shambles, that 
anti-Christian sensationalists are so fond of denounc- 
ing. We must indeed, if we are to be true to realities, 
make no less strong affirmation to the contrary. 



DISPROVE THE LOVE OF GOD? 35 

How far in the light of competent modern know- 
ledge we ought to go, may surely be stated with 
fairness in the language of a well-known and highly 
esteemed surgeon, not long passed away, who com- 
bined with ample scientific knowledge and vast ac- 
quaintance with human suffering, what he himself 
termed " emancipation from all Christian creeds," and 
so, for twenty years, pursued an unbiassed quest in 
the history and conditions of human development. 
The unequivocal testimony, then, of the late Sir 
Henry Thompson, which at the end of his prolonged 
research he found himself compelled to utter, is 
this :— 

" I was now assured by evidence which I 
could not resist, that all which man with his 
limited knowledge and experience has learned 
to regard as due to Supreme Power and Wisdom, 
although immeasurably beyond his comprehen- 
sion, is also associated with the exercise of an 
absolutely beneficent influence over all living 
things, of every grade, which exist within its 
range. 

11 And the result of my labour has at least 
brought me its own reward, by conferring eman- 
cipation from the fetters of all the creeds, and 
unshakable confidence in the Power, the Wis- 
dom and the Beneficence which pervade and 
rule the Universe." 1 

Such a testimony, from such a source, is in itself 
sufficient answer to most of the diatribes against 
nature which are so sensationally paraded by unbe- 
lief. It covers all the ground of Mr. J. S. Mill's 
famous indictment, in his autobiography and his 
11 Essays on Religion " ; whilst it comes from an ob- 
server whose whole life-work entitled him to speak 

1 " The Unknown God," p. 85. 



36 DOES THE MYSTERY OF PAIN 

on such matters with much more authority. It may, 
therefore, avail to set us free from the glamour of 
popular appeals under this head. 

But it does not amount to as much as the Psalmist's 
conviction — " The Lord is good to all, and His tender 
mercies are over all His works " — " Like as a Father 
pities his children, so the Lord pities those who fear 
Him ". Still less does it convey the assurance of 
the actuality of the divine Fatherhood, concerning 
which Jesus speaks so unequivocally, — "Are not 
two sparrows sold for a farthing, and not one of 
them shall fall on the ground without your Father. 
But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. 
Fear not therefore ; ye are of more value than many 
sparrows." Such words are a true summary of His 
whole doctrine, and the figurative phrases in which 
it is conveyed only emphasize the unmistakableness 
of his assurance. 

The question of questions thus becomes — Can we 
accept finally such an assurance from Him as ever- 
lastingly true? Or is it hopelessly contradicted before 
our eyes, in that realm of daily fact from which no 
one of us can escape ? Atheism, secularism, pessim- 
ism, agnosticism, and all other anti-Christian cults, 
combine to affirm the latter. Their main thesis is 
that nature, including human history on evolution- 
ary lines, does so utterly and hopelessly contradict 
Christ that we can no longer believe Him. Their 
conclusion is that — "There is no Heavenly Father 
watching tenderly over us His children. He is but 
the baseless shadow of a wistful human dream." 1 
Modern agnosticism sometimes tries to halt between 
two opinions, but practically endorses this verdict 
whilst professing to keep an open mind. Christian 
theism, however, does not hesitate to reject their 

1 R. Blatchford, " God and My Neighbour," p. 79. 



DISPROVE THE LOVE OF GOD? 37 

melancholy conclusions. All unashamed in spite of, 
or rather by reason of, our utmost modern know- 
ledge, it affirms that nature, fairly interpreted, not 
only does not contradict Christ, but actually en- 
courages us to trust His teaching where it can itself 
no longer speak definitely. After listening patiently 
to the sweeping denunciations and bitter invectives 
which characterize most of the utterances of unbelief 
in this regard, theism deliberately formulates a four- 
fold reply. It objects to these objections that, taken 
as a whole, (i) They are grossly indiscriminate, and 
thus guilty of misleading exaggeration ; (2) that they 
most unfairly ignore important and decisive modi- 
fications; (3) that they exhibit inexcusable one- 
sidedness ; (4) that they give no fair heed to the 
valid grounds for Christian faith. Full consideration 
of any one of these would require a volume. Such 
a summary, however, as must here suffice, may have 
suggestive, even if not conclusive value. 

1. The indiscriminateness which leads to gross 
exaggeration is twofold. The moral element in the 
whole case is confused with the non-moral, and the 
animal is identified with the human. The result is 
a misrepresentation as unwarranted in the one case 
as untrue to fact in the other. 

Of the inexcusable confusion between non-moral 
pain and moral evil, we will take two brief specimens, 
one popular, the other academic. The author of 
"God and My Neighbour," writes, that "If God 
were a God of love, He would not choose to create 
a world in which hate and pain should have a place. 
Why does He permit evil and pain to continue ? " 
This thoughtless simplicity, by which " hate " and 
" evil " are classified as of the same order with 
"pain," may do very well for cheap journalism, but 
is altogether unworthy of any serious teacher. To 
the same effect, however, Prof. Haeckel writes : — 



38 DOES THE MYSTERY OF PAIN 

11 We read daily in our journals of accidents 
and crimes of all kinds which cause the unex- 
pected death of happy human beings. Every 
year we read with horror the statistics of the 
thousands of deaths from shipwreck and railway 
accidents, earthquakes and landslips, wars 
and epidemics. And then we are asked to be- 
lieve in a loving Providence that has decreed 
the death of these poor mortals. Simple 
children and dull believers may soothe them- 
selves with such phrases. They no longer 
impose on educated people in the twentieth 
century, who prefer a full and fearless know- 
ledge of the truth." 1 

Such sentiments are an almost invariable concomi- 
tant of anti-Christian writing. But the philosophy 
is as poor as the tone is contemptuous. " Accidents 
and crimes," " wars and epidemics," are roughly 
flung together as if of the same significance ; when 
even a child can see that under no circumstances 
whatever can an " accident " be a " crime," and that 
"wars" are due to an altogether different cause 
from " epidemics ". The object of such recklessness 
on Prof. Haeckel's part is plainly to work in the 
word "decreed," which is at once a false and ques- 
tion-begging term. The Christian doctrine of Pro- 
vidence does not for a moment concede that God has 

1 "The Wonders of Life," p. 46. One of the pitiful features of 
modern unbelief is its apparent inability to keep from sneering at 
those who differ from it. Thus, on another occasion, the same 
Professor says, " The beautiful dream of God's goodness and wisdom 
in nature, to which we listened as children so devoutly fifty years ago, 
no longer finds credit now — at least amongst educated people who 
think " (" Confession of Faith," p. 74). One would have thought 
that Sir Henry Thompson, not to mention the host of other be- 
lievers, was quite as well " educated " as Professor Haeckel. But 
such contemptuous bitterness is by no means confined to this writer. 



DISPROVE THE LOVE OF GOD? 39 

" decreed the deaths" of the victims of crime and 
war. These are moral actions for which the doers 
of them are responsible. Even if it were true that 
all non-moral suffering came from such a decree, it 
ought in the name of intellectual honesty to be 
always kept entirely distinct from the suffering and 
misery which are due directly to human wrong-do- 
ing. As intimated in the preceding section, such 
honestly thoughtful discrimination would relieve 
Providence of the responsibility for some seven- 
tenths of all human woe. Such a significant con- 
clusion may conflict with the intention of these 
anti-Christian indictments, but it is nevertheless 
true, and ought therefore to be recognized. 

2. Another source of confusion, quite as common 
and misleading in its exaggerated misrepresentation, 
is the way in which the suffering of the animal world 
in general is put on a level with human suffering, 
estimated in human terms, and measured according 
to human sensitiveness. Waiving for a moment the 
general though unpardonable one-sidedness of the 
usual tirade against nature, the point to be here ob- 
served is that by far the greater part of the sensa- 
tional pictures drawn to discredit the Christian 
doctrine of a Heavenly Father on the ground of 
animal suffering, is pure bathos with no scientific 
warrant whatever. The paragraph from " God and 
My Neighbour " given below, 1 is a fair specimen. It 

1 " Nature is red in beak and claw. On land and in sea, the 
animal creation chase and maim and slay and devour each other. 
The beautiful swallow on the wing devours the equally beautiful 
gnat. The ichneumon fly lays its eggs under the skin of the cater- 
pillar. The eggs are hatched by the warmth of the caterpillar's blood. 
They produce a brood of larvae which devour the caterpillar alive. 
A pretty child dances on the village green. Her feet crush creeping 
things ; there is a busy ant or a blazoned beetle with its back broken, 
writhing in the dust unseen. A germ flies from a stagnant pool and 
the laughing child, its mother's darling, dies dreadfully of diphtheria. 



40 DOES THE MYSTERY OF PAIN 

is taken from a chapter of five pages, in which the 
writer settles the whole age-long difficulty to his 
own complete satisfaction. But apart from the ab- 
surd entomology which credits the ant and beetle 
with a back that can be broken, the whole suggestion 
is as false as sensationalism can make it. Human 
sensitiveness, in a word, is recklessly attributed to 
creatures which are no more capable of it than this 
writer is of the experience of a Mahatma. All such 
terms as "terror," " devour alive," "writhing," etc., 
have no real application whatever to the creatures in 
question. One might with much more reason attri- 
bute the nervous tremors of a delicate English lady 
v to a North American Indian, or a " nerveless 
Chinee". 1 

A volcano bursts suddenly into eruption and a beautiful city is a heap 
of ruins, and its inhabitants are charred or mangled corpses. And 
the Heavenly Father who is love, has power to save, and makes no 
sign. Is it not so ? " 

This writer's own answer to his own question is given at the com- 
mencement of this section. It may also be interesting to note his 
brother's reply in the columns of the same " Clarion ". " What 
does this charge of cruelty amount to ? Simply that everything lives 
upon something else. Beasts, birds, fishes, reptiles, insects, even 
man himself. In short, we live upon life, which is the only thing 
nature has to offer us. These natural modes of gaining a living do 
not shock me, or dismay me, or put me out of conceit with my 
divinity. I only know that Nature is overwhelming in her power 
and transcendently beautiful ; and that she is the source of all life, 
and health and joy. No ; I cannot tell you what is the meaning 
of a scheme far beyond human apprehension. But I know it is 
safe to trust in my sweetheart Nature, and feel certain she will 
never mislead those who do." 

1 Dr. A. R. Wallace mentions the case of some Australian tribes 
j where the man who is found guilty of a crime "appears before the 
chief of the tribe, holds out his leg, and one after another the 
members of the offended family walk up, each sticks in his spear, 
draws it out, and retires. When all have done so, the leg is a mass 
of torn flesh and skin and blood, but the sufferer has stood still 
without shrinking during the whole operation. He is very soon as 
well as ever, except for a badly scarred leg " (" The World of 
Life," p. 379). Chinese callousness to suffering also is proverbial. 






DISPROVE THE LOVE OF GOD? 41 

With much more truth than popular arraignments 
of nature exhibit, the thoughtful author of " Evil 
and Evolution," points out " how difficult it is to say 
what are really criteria in the matter of the suffer- 
ings of animals ". 

"The convulsive struggles that animals make 
cannot be regarded as any criterion of the pain 
they are suffering, nor does the mere existence 
of nerves appear to be altogether reliable. The 
sting of a wasp is to a human being one of the 
keenest sensations. But a badger, which is an 
animal tolerably well endowed with nerves, 
will dig out a nest of wasps and eat as many of 
them as he can catch, quite indifferent to their 
stings. Frogs and toads will also swallow 
wasps whenever they get the chance." 1 

In regard, however, to the generally prevalent 
notion that the animal world is — to quote Schopen- 
hauer's phrase — " a cockpit of tortured and suffering- 
beings, " two observers of nature, at all events, ought 
to weigh with modern men, viz. Charles Darwin 
and Alfred Russel Wallace. If these authorities 
are not competent to judge, we may truly say that 
no one is. Prof. Haeckel's phrase runs, " The 
raging war of interests in human society is only a 
feeble picture of the unceasing and terrible war of 
existence which reigns throughout the whole of the 
living world ". But what does Darwin say of this 
" unceasing and terrible war " ? At the close of his 
chapter on the "struggle for existence," he thus 
writes : — 

"When we reflect on this struggle, we may 
console ourselves with the full belief that the 
war of nature is not incessant, that no fear is 

1 P . 130. 



42 DOES THE MYSTERY OF PAIN 

felt, that death is generally prompt, and that 
the vigorous, the healthy, and the happy, survive 
and multiply." 

To the same subject, in his book on " Darwinism," 
Dr. Wallace refers thus : — 

"We have a horror of all violent and sudden 
death, because we think of the life full of pro- 
mise cut short, of hopes and expectations un- 
fulfilled, and of the grief of mourning relatives. 
But all this is quite out of place in the case of 
animals, for whom a violent and sudden death 
is in every way the best. Thus the poet's 
picture of — 

' Nature red in tooth and claw 
With ravine ' 

is a picture the evil of which is read into it by 
our imaginations, the reality being made up of 
full and happy lives, usually terminated by the 
quickest and least painful of deaths." 

Referring more especially to Prof. Huxley's sensa- 
tional indictment, Dr. Wallace says : — 

14 There is good reason to believe that all this is 
greatly exaggerated, that the supposed torments 
and miseries of animals have little real existence, 
but are the reflection of the imagined sensations 
of cultivated men and women in similar circum- 
stances, and that the amount of actual suffering 
caused by the struggle for existence amongst 
animals, is altogether insignificant." : 

1 " Darwinism," pp. 37, 40. As these estimates were written 
twenty years ago, it may be of interest to note the same eminent 
authority's opinion in his latest work "The World of Life " : — 

" In this category of painless or almost painless animals, I think 
we may place almost all aquatic animals up to fishes, all the vast 
hordes of insects, probably all mollusca and worms, thus reducing 
the sphere of pain to a minimum throughout all the earlier geological 



DISPROVE THE LOVE OF GOD? 43 

The well-known naturalist, Mr. E. Kay Robinson, 
in his remarkable book "The Religion of Nature" 
started his special investigation thus : — 

" For more than a score of years the problem 
of the apparent cruelty of the world was daily 
on my mind. Nature in almost all its details 
seemed to undermine the very basis of religion ; 
— the seeming atrocities which are common- 
places in nature are often almost too horrid to 
be described in print " . . . " but gradually I came 
to see the very truth, and now I find nature to 
be the bed-rock of true religion." 

His deliberate, reasoned, fact-supported conclusion 
is that " There is no cruelty or suffering in nature, 
except where it exists in the thoughts of men ". 
Whether such a conclusion appears to be credible to 
ordinary observers or not, there is overwhelming 
evidence to warrant Dr. Wallace's judgement that : — 

" On the whole, then, we conclude that the 
popular idea of the struggle for existence entail- 
ages, and very largely even now. We may be sure that all the 
earlier forms of life possessed the minimum of sensation required for 
the purposes of their short existence, and that anything approaching to 
what we term 'pain,' was unknown to them " (p. 375). 

As to the elaborate contrivances for shedding blood or causing 
pain that are seen throughout nature, the vicious-looking teeth and 
claws of the cat tribe, etc., etc., on which such stress is often laid : 
" The idea that all these weapons exist for the purpose of shedding 
blood, or giving pain, is wholly illusory. As a matter of fact their 
effect is wholly beneficial, even to the sufferers, inasmuch as they 
tend to the diminution of pain " (p. 377). 

Referring to the degree to which civilized man is increasingly ex- 
posed to perils of which animals know nothing, he adds : " Against 
this vast ever-present network of dangers, together with the ever- 
present danger of consuming fire, man is warned and protected by 
an ever-increasing sensibility to pain, a horror at the very sight of 
wounds and blood ; and it is this specially developed sensibility that 
we most illogically transfer to the animal world, in our wholly ex- 
aggerated and often quite mistaken views as to the cruelty of 
nature " (p. 379). 



44 DOES THE MYSTERY OF PAIN 

ing misery and pain on the animal world, is the 
very reverse of the truth. What it really brings 
about is the maximum of life, and of the enjoy- 
ment of life with the minimum of suffering and 
pain." 

With such testimony, from such sources, we are 
warranted in dismissing almost the whole of the 
usual laboured indictment of nature on the ground 
of cruelty in the animal world, from further consid- 
eration. It does not justify the anti-Christian use 
made of it. It does not contradict the love of a God 
whose " tender mercies are over all His works ". 

(3) It was noted above that the opposition to 
Christian faith under this head is quite unfair, in 
ignoring very important modifications of the indict- 
ment, which ought to be taken into full account. 
These are, the manifest mortal and moral elements 
in human nature. We may freely acknowledge that 
the mystery of pain only really or seriously begins 
when, leaving the animal world, we address our 
attention to the human realm. But we are certainly 
entitled to demand a fair definition of what the 
human actually connotes. Are physical immortality, 
and non-morality, necessary constituents of human 
nature? Surely the true reply is — Certainly not. 
But both of these lie as latent assumptions in the 
usual denials of the love of God on the ground of 
human suffering. 

(i) As to the first : " Killing," says Mr. J. S. Mill, 
"the most criminal act recognized by human laws, 
Nature does once to every human being that lives ". 
From which the inference, apparently intended, is 
that nature is criminal because men die. It is a 
strangely false position, for an avowed logician. 
For, as Mr. Wallace points out, "Without death and 
reproduction, there could have been no progressive 
development of the organic world ". There must be 



DISPROVE THE LOVE OF GOD? 45 

some perversity in objecting to a method of nature 
to which we owe our very existence. 1 With the 
old theology which attributed human mortality to 
the literal historic accuracy of the opening chapters 
of Genesis, we are no longer concerned. In the fact 
endorsed by science and history as well as observa- 
tion, that by their very constitution " it is appointed 
unto men once to die," there is no ground whatever 
for calling in question the love of a Heavenly Father 
for his human children. 

(ii) Attention has already been called to the indis- 
criminateness of the unbelief which confuses the 
moral with the non-moral in its reckless allegations 
against Divine Providence. But the emphasis of 
repetition is here necessary, in order to clear away 
once and for all the greatest misrepresentation of 
the whole case. 

Prof. Haeckel asks, in his usual style : — 

" How can this all-loving God answer for the 
immeasurable sum of want and misery and pain 
and unhappiness which He sees accumulated 
before Him every year, in the lives and families 
of States, cities, and hospitals ? " 

But there is no more real reason why God should 

1 Prof. Peake has well stated the case thus. " Still less can 
death be called an evil. This is obviously true as it affects the race. 
No death would soon mean no birth. Those in possession would 
prevent new comers from trenching on their domain. Thus life with 
its blessings would be confined to the few, instead of being distributed 
to many swiftly succeeding generations. In such a world progress 
would be inconceivably difficult, the dead weight of custom would 
crush all aspirations to reform. Even if fresh lives came into it, what 
could they do pitted against the tyranny of tradition backed by 
power and the timidity of experience ? Far better that death should 
remove the men callous to abuse and hostile to reform, and that men 
of warmer impulses, higher ideals, more generous enthusiasm, should 
fill their place. And even for the individual, death is in itself no un- 
happy fate " (" Problem of Suffering in the Old Testament," p. 138). 



46 DOES THE MYSTERY OF PAIN 

"answer for" all this, than that Prof. Haeckel him- 
self should answer for all the misery in his native 
city. There is no more unwarranted petitio quces- 
tionis in all philosophy, than this wholesale assump- 
tion of Divine responsibility for everything, without 
discrimination. It is altogether useless to keep on 
repeating, as popular unbelief does, 1 that " If God is 
responsible for man's existence, God is responsible 
for man's acts ". For it is a sheer contradiction in 
terms which only the wilfully blind can refuse to see. 
The creature who is not responsible, is not a man at 
all, but a machine — a thing. The only conceivable 
ground for Divine responsibility in his case would be 
that he does not act at all ; any more than the pen 
acts with which these words are written. There is 
no need here to go farther into the " Free will " con- 
troversy. 2 Unbelief has no right whatever to assume 
that men are but marionettes. Yet this is what is 
continually done by so-called " Rationalism," in order 
to charge upon God the sum total of human woe. 
Thus a book issued for the " Rationalist Press As- 
sociation," says to the general reader — 

" Whether your creed is, that of the most 
rigid Calvinist or the most generous optimist, 
in either case, and apart from all subsidiary 
questions of sin and salvation, you have back 
of the whole complication the one supreme inde- 
pendent omnipotent will, purposing and plan- 
ning the whole thing, not only in its vast outlines, 
but in all the minutiae of its detail — conceiving 
and arranging every enormity, every abortion, 
every pain, every weird and wicked thing, as 

1 In Mr. Blatchford's "God and My Neighbour," it is printed 
in italics four times in as many pages. 

2 The whole matter is fully faced in modern light, in my volume 
" Determinism— False and True " (C. Kelly). 



DISPROVE THE LOVE OF GOD? 47 

surely as every beauty, every glory, every glad- 
ness, inspiration, or perfection." 

No falser statement could be perpetrated in print. 
The mischief is that it falls, with others of its kind, 
into the hands of the young and uneducated, and 
serves the purpose of making the mystery of pain to 
be so black in its enormity as to crush out, if possible, 
all Christian belief. But any one who writes about 
the " subsidiary question of sin," in dealing with the 
human mystery of pain, only shows that he has pre- 
judged and misjudged the whole question from the 
beginning, by an unwarrantable assumption. How 
unwarrantable, apart from philosophic argument, is 
manifest from the fact that there is no single place, 
or condition, in civilized or indeed human society, 
where this " deterministic " irresponsibility on the 
part of men and women is, or can be, practised. 

Dr. F. R. Tennant has put more truth in this 
regard into one sentence, than is found in whole 
libraries of Determinism. 1 " Responsibility for the 
possibility of moral evil, and for the opportunities 
for its realization, lies with God; responsibility 
for the actuality of moral evil lies with man." 2 
Christian philosophy does not desire in the least to 
shrink from the suggestion of the true Divine re- 
sponsibility here outlined. But it protests with all 
possible earnestness, against the falsity of the whole- 
sale charges brought against Divine Providence, by 
means of dragging down human nature to the level of 
the brute, or even lower, and enunciating the dogma 
of moral irresponsibility. A few more words from 
Dr. Tennant should suffice to decide the matter for 
all who have an open mind : — 

1 For the justification of this term, I must refer the reader to the 
volume on the subject, specified above. 

" "The Origin and Propagation of Sin," p. 122. 



48 DOES THE MYSTERY OF PAIN 

" Had evolution stopped short at the stage of 
lower animal life, and not proceeded until 
human experience appeared, there would have 
been indeed no sin ; but there would also have 
been no possibility of moral good ; no room 
for a revelation of the love and holiness of God. 
And unless we are prepared to maintain that 
the non-existence of persons, a world of mere 
things or of conscious automatons, is the 
highest ideal of a universe which man can con- 
ceive, we have no right to deny that the present 
world, with all its sin and misery, is compatible 
with the love of a righteous God. If the notion 
of a moral being incapable of evil be a contra- 
diction which even omnipotence cannot realize, 
then the establishment of the possibility of sin, 
so far from being inconsistent with the love and 
holiness of God, is unquestionably its most 
adequate and indispensable expression." 1 

It follows that the only way in which the custom- 
ary sweeping indictments of the love of God in 
human affairs can be justified, is by the degradation 
of man. But as, even according to Mr. J. S. Mill's 
declaration, " it is better to be a man dissatisfied than 
a pig satisfied," so the self-respect of ordinary human- 
ity will agree that it is better to be a man in pain, than 
a brute in peace. There is something for men and 
women, after all, better, higher, nobler, than mere 
painlessness, 2 and that is moral character. 

But the possibility of moral character which 
crowns man with glory and honour, at the same 

1 op. cit. p. 139. 

2 Mr. J. H. Peile, in his most valuable Bampton Lectures for 
1907, has truly said hereupon, "The belief that pain is the one real 
evil infects much of our social and philanthropic effort to-day, 
and is a chief obstacle to the acceptance of real Christianity — but 
short of Christianity, reason and experience teach us better things " 
(p. 64). 



DISPROVE THE LOVE OF GOD? 49 

time relieves God of responsibility for by far the 
greater part of human woe. It is immeasurably 
more against His will than against ours. Human 
capacity and responsibility necessarily go hand in 
hand. But for that capacity, in the words of a pro- 
nounced evolutionist — 

"We should have been the denizens of a 
world of puppets, where neither morality nor 
religion could have found place or meaning. 
The mystery of evil remains indeed a mystery 
still, but it is no longer a harsh dissonance such 
as greeted the poet's ears when the doors of 
hell were thrown open ; for we see that this 
mystery belongs among the profound harmonies 
of God's creation." 1 

4. When the moral element is eliminated from 
the usual objections to the Fatherly goodness of 
God, we may classify the remaining human suffer- 
ing for which man is sometimes not responsible, 
under the three heads of premature death, disease, 
and calamity. 

(i) The first of these confessedly constitutes a 
real problem of sorrow and perplexity for every 
thoughtful mind and every tender heart. We do 
not say, as virulently as Prof. Haeckel concerning 
the early death of Heinrich Hertz, that — 

11 Like the premature death of Spinoza, 
Raphael, Schubert, and many other great men, 
it is one of those brutal facts of human history 
which are enough of themselves to destroy the 
untenable myth of a wise Providence and an 
all-loving Father in Heaven." 

But if we shrink from the " brutal " confidence with 
which such a dogma of unbelief is enunciated, it 

1 Mr. J. Fiske, "Through Nature to God," p. 56. 

4 



50 DOES THE MYSTERY OF PAIN 

must be owned that the removal of many of the best 
young lives, with the perpetuation of many of the 
worst, has always constituted a severe problem for 
faith, from the days of the Psalmist until now. 
The protest of Christian faith, however, remains 
valid, viz. that, to employ Haeckel's terminology, 
the "thanatism " which affirms that death ends all, 
is certainly not proven, and modern science gives it 
no more warrant than human instinct. 1 God, free- 
dom, and immortality are inseparable. The Chris- 
tian faith which here sometimes trusts in the dark 
to the love of a Heavenly Father, does so on the dis- 
tinct understanding that this life is not the only 
realm of relationship to Him. In such a connexion 
"premature" loses it significance. It applies only 
to the present life. To us who are bereft, the loss 
may indeed be real beyond repair. But until the 
Christian promise of the future is proved to be im- 
possible, there is no sufficient reason in such loss for 
denying the Divine love which, if real, is also eternal, 
(ii) As to the prevalence of disease, whilst nothing 
is easier than to conjure up harrowing facts which 
cannot be denied, nothing also is falser than to write 
and speak as if there were no other side to it. We 
must all acknowledge that the painful mystery, in 
many individual cases of extreme suffering, is, to us, 
insoluble. The utter indiscriminateness, moreover, 
with which disease sometimes appears to be distri- 
buted, taking no account whatever of moral char- 
acter or spiritual elevation, together with the 
apparently useless intensity of the suffering which 
accompanies some forms of disease, dumbfound us 
with dire perplexity. Yet this is just the case in 
which the anti-Christian mood which calls itself 

1 For further discussion I must be content to refer the reader to 
the chapter on " Immortality " in my " Haeckel's Monism False". 



DISPROVE THE LOVE OF GOD? 51 

11 Rationalism " should be most true to its avowed 
principles. It describes itself thus : — 

" Rationalism may be defined as the mental 
attitude which unreservedly accepts the supre- 
macy of reason, and aims at establishing a 
system of philosophy and ethics verifiable by 
experience, and independent of all arbitrary 
assumption or authority." 

Such a definition will admirably suit Christian 
philosophy. In the present case, all that is asked is 
that the " Rationalistic " objector to Divine Provid- 
ence should be true to his principles. But this is 
precisely what he is not. Instead of the supremacy 
of reason, we are bidden acknowledge the suprem- 
acy of emotion. Judgement " according to appear- 
ance," not just judgement, is the method adopted. 
Would it be any more just than wise in estimating 
the position of a business man, to make the most of 
all his debts, and take no heed at all of his assets ? 
Yet that is exactly what unbelief does in the great, 
grave, and complicated matter before us. It can 
never see the wood for the trees. It demands that 
everything dark, painful, mysterious, shall be cast 
into the scale against the love of God, but will not 
heed any suggestion that mitigations, explanations, 
compensations, illuminations, should be cast into the 
other scale on behalf of Providential care. Such a 
method is really absurd to the point of immorality. 
As matter of plain and undeniable fact, there is 
not only a real but an enormous " other side ". In- 
deed, when all is fairly and fully set forth, in a 
detail which is impossible here, the relation of the 
dark side to the bright may in sober truthfulness be 
likened to that of the light and heat of the sun as 
compared with the darkness of its spots. Then 
" Rationalism " calls upon us to dwell intensely on 



52 DOES THE MYSTERY OF PAIN 

the latter, but studiously avoid noticing the former ! 
Whether this be a rational proceeding, common 
sense, apart altogether from religion, may be left to 
judge. Many items in the case merit elaboration, 
but they can here only be suggested. 

(i) Be the mystery of disease what it may, the 
greater portion of it is more or less directly traceable 
not to nature, but to man's interference with nature. 
Thus Sir E. Ray Lankester tells us, in his Romanes 
Lecture on " Nature and Man," that — 

" It is a remarkable thing that the adjustment 
of organisms to their surroundings is so severely 
complete in nature, apart from man, that diseases 
are unknown as constant and normal phenomena 
under those conditions. It seems to be a legiti- 
mate view that every disease to which animals, 
and probably plants also, are liable, excepting 
i as a transient and very exceptional occurrence, 
is due to man's interference." 1 

And if we pass on to the consideration of the diseases 
which especially afflict humanity, and bethink our- 
selves of epidemics, as well as of the consumption, 
scrofula, syphilis, scarlet fever, diphtheria, etc., which 
may be regarded as chronic epidemics, we are told 
that if men chose — 

" By the unstinted application of known 
methods of investigation and consequent con- 
trolling action, all epidemic disease could be 
abolished within so short a period as fifty years. 
It is merely a question of the employment of 
the means at our command. . . . 

" This malady and the use of alcohol as a 
beverage, are together responsible for more than 
half the disease and early death of the mature 
population of Europe. . . . And now the complete 

1 P . 28. 



DISPROVE THE LOVE OF GOD? 53 

suppression of this dire enemy of humanity is 
as plain and certain a piece of work to be at 
once accomplished as is the building of an iron- 
clad. But it will not be done for many years, 
because of the ignorance and unbelief of those 
who alone can act for the community in such 
matters." 1 

It may be answered — why should there be such 
diseases at all to require stamping out ? The reply 
must be another question with unmeasured signi- 
ficance — why should there be any drink, or lust, or 
greed, or dirt, or selfishness, to cause them ? It is 
not enough to say that these are instances of man's 
interference with the order of nature. The supple- 
mentary truth is that this order of nature is the ex- 
pression, as Sir Henry Thompson averred, of a 
Divine benevolence which is always working for the 
greatest happiness of the greatest number. The 
pain, therefore, which follows upon its violation, is 
but a protest and a warning which together em- 
phasize the benevolence. 

(ii) Another item persistently overlooked by the 
arraigners of Divine goodness, is writ large before 
our eyes whenever we choose to read it, in the 
limitation put to possibilities of pain through the 
physical uniformity of the species. Were we but 
the offspring of chance, or of almighty malignity, 
nothing would be more easily conceivable than a 
world full of beings so utterly unlike that no simil- 
arity of structure would obtain between millions. 
In that case, whilst the possibilities of disease would 
be unbounded, the opportunities of relieving or heal- 
ing them by human skill would be annihilated. The 
laws of physiology are the necessary condition of 
all medical science, whilst therapeutics depend 

'PP- 30, 31. 



54 DOES THE MYSTERY OF PAIN 

absolutely for their value upon the wondrous ana- 
logies between human bodies, which enable the 
skilled physician, through wide experience, to be- 
come the sufferer's friend in need. 

(iii) But behind all such skill, whether medical or 
surgical, there is always something else without 
which neither would avail. This is the measureless 
Mystery of Good which it is almost sacrilege to dis- 
miss in a couple of sentences. But two terms may 
serve as pointers to a boundless field. 

What "phagocytosis" means scientifically, must 
be left to a technical lecture on that theme. But 
what it means practically was lucidly explained by 
Sir Frederick Treves — whose authority will hardly 
be questioned — a short time since, in an address 
to the Edinburgh Philosophical Institution. " He 
claimed," says the report, 

" that the popular view of disease as a calamity 
was altogether erroneous, for its phenomena or 
symptoms were marked by a purpose, and that 
purpose was beneficent. The processes of 
disease aimed not at the destruction of life but 
at the saving of it. If it were not for disease, 
in the popular sense, human life would soon be 
extinct. He who grumbled about a cold, was 
finding fault with the measures of relief to which 
he owed his life." 

Again, what does the surgeon mean when he looks 
favourably upon a wound with the remark that it 
will probably heal by " first intention " ? Only this, 
that the indescribably wondrous microcosm of the 
body is so constructed that — so long as a man has 
not poisoned it with alcohol, or nicotine, or aught of 
the kind — the moment any injury happens to it, that 
moment it begins to repair itself. Were it not for 
such prompt, ceaseless and effective self-repair, no 
reader of these pages would be alive at this hour. 



DISPROVE THE LOVE OF GOD? 55 

(iv) Yet is there something still more remarkable, 
and as a mystery of good absolutely insoluble, which, 
because it is the most wonderful of all, receives from 
most men least attention of all. We hear, ad 
nauseam, of the mystery of pain, but how is it that 
scarcely any one makes mention of the mystery of 
painlessness ? It is the more unfair, as well as 
amazing, because the former, whatever stress be 
laid upon it, is verily a trifle compared with the 
latter. Here is an indescribably complex organism, 
with some thirty trillions [sic] of anatomical elements 
all living and working together to constitute it. 
Health means the perfect balance of all these, in 
such fashion that they all support each other with 
an energetic solidarity elsewhere unparalleled. Dis- 
ease means that some few out of this colossal host 
get out of hand — for there is an unmistakable unified 
government of the total organism — and so make the 
mischief we call disease. The accompanying pain 
is but the reminder, and generally speaking, the 
measure of the mischief. In a moment we will ap- 
preciate this. Here, mark the almost incredible fact 
that those who profess to adore the supremacy of 
reason, deem it reasonable to ignore, as nothing 
worthy of notice, the condition when thirty trillions 
of living items are so working together in painless 
harmony as to make human life a joy and power. 
But when a comparatively small fraction of them go 
wrong, that constitutes sufficient ground for indict- 
ing the Author of nature as lacking in benevolence ! 
The unfairness of unbelief in this respect is only 
equalled by its credulity in others. Meanwhile, as 
a matter of positive fact, everywhere and always, in 
every respect, in every age, in every family no less 
than in every nation, and in the immeasurable 
majority of individual men and women, the mystery 
of good is as manifestly greater than the mystery of 



56 DOES THE MYSTERY OF PAIN 

ill, as the human body itself is than any one of its 
component parts. If, then, God is debited with the 
latter, assuredly He should also be credited with the 
former. Such fairness in reasoning may not answer 
all our questions, but it will suffice to silence the 
gibes of unbelief, and contribute something real and 
great towards good grounds for genuine belief. 

5. The same principles apply to the human 
woes associated with natural phenomena such as 
earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, famines, accidents, 
epidemics. When the human or moral element is 
eliminated from these, however harrowing to sheer 
feeling certain known cases may be, calm judgement 
cannot rationally regard them as contradictions to 
the general reality of benevolence in nature. The 
main mitigations — which would bear careful elabora- 
tion — are such as these. 

Earthquakes are terrible in themselves, but they 
are not the mere centres of Titanic malignity that 
they are often made out to be. There are very real 
modifications of such indictment, (a) All those who 
are thereby killed would have died naturally in the 
course of a few years. The mere fact, therefore, of 
their death, does not come into the account, (b) As 
to the manner of death, its painfulness is grossly 
exaggerated. Most of them would have suffered 
more in the ordinary way of human disease, than 
in the overwhelming eruption or convulsion. In 
numberless cases there is no suffering at all. 1 
(c) None of the sufferers were compelled by Divine 
Providence to go and live in a district known to be 

1 Did space permit, hundreds of instances might be quoted show- 
ing that in accidents, just as in the case of seizure by wild animals, 
there is a natural and merciful process of nervous inhibition which 
acts as a perfect anaesthetic. In a little book entitled " Is Nature 
Cruel ? " by J. C. Hirst (Jas. Clarke), many wen-authenticated instances 
are cited which afford reliable answer to the lurid sensationalism 
usually expended on this theme. 






DISPROVE THE LOVE OF GOD? 57 

liable to such occurrences. Yet even after an earth- 
quake, as in Calabria, or Sicily, or San Francisco, 
no sooner is the convulsion past than fresh buildings 
are erected on the same spot, in defiance of all 
warnings as to what is there possible, (d) Even 
then, great part of the suffering is due to human 
selfishness and carelessness in building. 1 This cer- 
tainly ought not to be charged to Divine Providence ; 
any more than numberless " accidents " which have 
plainly happened through culpable human neglect. 
(e) The only ground on which such occurrences 
could legitimately come into an indictment of Divine 
goodness, would be that they formed part of a 
general scheme which was working for human ill. 
But this is exactly the opposite of the truth. They 
are all necessary parts of a scheme which is working 
for the greatest good of the greatest number. Science 
is perfectly clear upon that point. 2 (/) The demand 
that there should never be any such occurrence, 

1 The Japanese committee of experts sent to investigate the San 
Francisco earthquake, reported by Dr. Nakamura, Professor of 
Architecture at Tokio University, that " dishonest mortar — a corrupt 
agglomeration of sea-sand and lime — was responsible for nearly all 
of the earthquake damage in San Francisco ". 

2 The testimony of Prof. Judd in his volume on "Volcanoes" 
(" International Scientific Series ") ought to suffice in this regard. 
He writes : " Terrible and overwhelming as these phenomena are, 
such sudden and violent manifestations of the subterranean energy 
must not be regarded as the only or the chief of their effects. The 
internal forces continually at work within the earth's crust, perform 
a series of most important functions in connection with the economy 
of the globe ; and were the actions of those forces to die out, our 
planet would soon cease to be fit for the habitation of living beings. 
... By the admirable balancing of the external and internal forces 
of our own globe, the conditions necessary to animal and vegetable 
existence are almost constantly maintained, and those interruptions 
of such conditions produced by hurricanes and floods, by volcanic 
outbursts and earthquakes, may safely be regarded as the insignificant 
accidents of what is on the whole a very perfectly working piece of 
machinery." 



58 DOES THE MYSTERY OF PAIN 

therefore, as an earthquake, is not only a demand 
for miraculous interference which is most inconsist- 
ent on the part of unbelief, but also for that which, 
according to expert scientific testimony, would only 
result in depopulating the earth. It is at least better 
that a few mortals should be sufferers, than that the 
whole race should perish. 

The very worst that can be truly said, then, in 
regard to these phenomena, however we confess 
them to be tragic in their effect upon limited num- 
bers of our fellow creatures, is, in Dr. Tennant's 
words, 1 that they " are but the inevitable by-products 
of the self-same course of Nature which on the 
whole ministers to life and health ". Unbelief must 
be very hard pressed to find in such a residuum a 
reason for the bitter invectives so often hurled at 
the present scheme of things. Mr. J. Fiske had no 
reputation for " orthodoxy," but his summary is both 
true and weighty. 

"To say that the ways of Providence are in- 
scrutable, is still something more than an idle 
platitude, and there is still room for the belief 
that, could we raise the veil that enshrouds 
eternal truth, we should see that behind nature's 
cruellest works there are secret springs of 
divinest tenderness and love." 2 

But this is far from being the whole case. Human 
suffering may always be divided into two categories, 
that which we can prevent or heal, and that which 
we cannot. There is no little room for plain speech 
in regard to both of these. 

(i) As to the former, the instinct within us which 
shrinks from pain and rejoices in health, is both 
natural and divine. On the broadest plane it must 

1 " Origin and Propagation of Sin," p. 135. 

2 " Through Nature to God," p. 46. 



DISPROVE THE LOVE OF GOD? 59 

be affirmed that disease is not the will of God, and 
that Chas. Kingsley was warranted in his avowal, 
" I will no more say that God made me sick, than 
that he made me a sinner ". Therein he did but echo 
the Master who " went about healing all manner of 
sickness and disease amongst the people ". The 
sneer of unbelief that when the unquestionable 
physical and ethical value of pain itself is recognized, 
we thereby welcome it for its own sake, is altogether 
uncalled for. As a matter of fact, those who most 
utterly believe in the moral and spiritual value of 
pain, as part of a divinely benevolent scheme, are 
the foremost workers in all efforts to relieve and 
prevent suffering. 

(ii) Moreover, in regard to that which at present 
we cannot either wholly prevent, or always heal, 
there is much to be truly said which should check 
the diatribes of scepticism, and in no small measure 
reassure the Christian heart. 

(1) Even on the low level of physical existence, as 
pointed out above by Sir Frederick Treves, pain is 
life's preservative. It is nature's warning bell, and 
tells us of the injury or danger which, if not heeded, 
would result in the destruction of the whole body. 
It were small gain to any man if on a cold winter's 
night he could put his feet into the fire without 
feeling any harm, and then presently find himself 
painlessly devoid of feet. 

(2) It is equally true that pain is often a moral 
protest and check. Moral evil is great enough in 
this poor world as it is. What it would be if there 
were no preventive or retributive checks through 
pain, who can say ? Dr. Gant, as an expert ob- 
server, may well hereupon express his testimony — 

" With relation, therefore, to both body and 
soul, suffering is not a curse but a blessing in 
disguise. The transgression of moral law is 



60 DOES THE MYSTERY OF PAIN 

productive of the larger proportion of human 
suffering in the body; and although when 
traceable to this source pain may be regarded 
as the punishment of evil doing, it is only a 
wholesome correction in infinite mercy for the 
f maintenance of both body and soul alive." 1 

(3) Certainly also pain has been the chief intel- 
lectual educator of mankind. Had man been created 
as incapable of pain as some would-be philan- 
thropists demand, he would yet have been in the 
condition of the primeval savage. Or may be lower, 
for even the savage learnt the use of fire, which he 
would never have done had he not been sensitive 
to the painfulness of cold. If civilization is at all 
better than savagery, it is because pain has whipped 
up the mind of man to levels above the brute. As 
it is, even now, all attempts to educate an ordinary 
child without the infliction of pain of any kind, 
would be abortive. One might, indeed, with real 
truth, go much farther, and say that some of the 
noblest enrichments of higher realms of thought 
have been the result of suffering. There is ample 
testimony that the heritage of intellectual profit 
which has come to us from such teachers as Dante, 
Darwin, Tennyson, F. W. Robertson, and R. L. 
Stevenson, etc., would never have been what it is 
but for the suffering which seemed to hinder but 
really made them what they were. 

(4) When it comes to lofty character in general, 
the result is still nobler and more unquestionable. 

1 " The Mystery of Suffering," by Dr. F. J. Gant, F.R.C.S., whose 
competence to speak may be best expressed in his own words : " Hav- 
ing been actively engaged in the relief of human suffering for a 
period of forty-five years, during thirty-seven of which I was a 
hospital surgeon, it has been my lot to witness more of the turmoils 
and distress in the body and soul of man than any other sphere of 
experience in relation to mankind could have offered for contem- 
plation ". 



DISPROVE THE LOVE OF GOD? 61 

(a) On the broad scale no sentence can be more true 
than that of Dr. Illingworth — " The pleasures of 
each generation evaporate in air ; it is their pains 
that increase the spiritual momentum of the world ".* 
And by the side of it the palpable folly of those who 
sigh for a perfectly painless world in which " health 
should be made catching instead of disease," becomes 
manifest. We should in such case exchange a world 
of noble endeavour for the pitiful delights of an 
enormous creche, a mere bipedal reproduction and 
perpetuation of the unmoral monsters of the Creta- 
ceous period, (b) It must also be remembered that 
all the vilest and cruellest deeds on record have been 
and are yet perpetrated by healthy men and women. 
Nero and Charles Peace had perfectly sound bodies ; 
whilst some, if not most, of the sweetest and nob- 
lest actions that lift humanity highest above brutal 
levels, have been and are yet done by invalids. 
(c) Even amongst ordinary and respectable society, 
it may be truly remarked that the hardest and least 
admirable of characters are to be found amongst 
those who never know ache or pain, whose example, 
if generally followed, would resolve mankind into a 
mere mob of isolated selfish units. On the other 
hand, (d) the sympathy which bespeaks the tenderest 
and divinest fellowship, and the solidarity which 
connotes human brotherhood, are evoked by suffer- 
ing and not by enjoyment. It is " fellow-feeling " 
in sorrow that "makes us wondrous kind," not 
perpetual painlessness or sensational gratification. 
Even amongst the opponents of the Christian view 
of Providence, we cannot but see that the best parts 
of their nature are those developed by the very pains 
and miseries that they so vehemently denounce. 
The writer of " God and My Neighbour," who so 
vigorously asserts that " in face of a knowledge of 

124. 



62 DOES THE MYSTERY OF PAIN 

life and the world, we cannot reasonably believe in 
a Heavenly Father," and shows himself only ridi- 
culous as a world-making philosopher, yet in actual 
dealing with the dark and pitiful side of life, be- 
comes a noble incarnation of chivalry and pity, of 
tenderness and unselfishness. These assuredly 
make manhood more divine than all the muscle of a 
Sandow, or the money-making cleverness of a 
Vanderbilt, or the brain of a Haeckel, or the power 
of a Napoleon, or the sensual self-gratification of a 
Nero. Mr. Hall Caine has only spoken the truth in 
saying that 

" If in the darkness of the mystery of suffer- 
ing we do not see the Divine face, we ought at 
least to see the lamp of human virtue. Take 
suffering out of the world, and what is left of 
heroism, and patience, and self-sacrifice ? " 

Enough has been said to show that, even on natural 
lines, the darkness of the mystery of suffering ought 
not to prevent our seeing the Divine face with at 
least sufficient clearness to save us from pessimism 
and despair. When we are modest enough to re- 
member the limitations of our faculties, and appreci- 
ate the fact that there is not one single riddle of the 
universe which science is able to solve, it should 
cease to trouble us that we cannot explain to our 
own satisfaction all that happens in the course of 
nature to such marvellously complex beings as our- 
selves. 1 There is certainly nothing in such failure 

1 Sir Oliver Lodge, commenting upon the pessimistic quatrain of 
Omar Khayyam — 

Ah Love, could thou and I with Fate conspire, 
To grasp this sorry scheme of things entire, 
Would not we shatter it to bits — and then 
Remould it nearer to the Heart's desire ? — 

well says, " The universe is in no way limited to our conceptions. If 



DISPROVE THE LOVE OF GOD? 63 

to forbid our listening to the world's greatest and 
best Teacher, when He gives us, on the warrant of 
His own character and life and example, a more 
comforting assurance and a larger hope than all the 
best in nature warrants. The total validity of His 
claims to reveal to humanity the actual and eternal 
Fatherhood, may be discussed elsewhere. This, at 
least, we know; that in Him the mystery of pain 
found its bitterest core ; and in Him also submissive 
trust in the eclipsed Fatherhood was exhibited to 
the uttermost. The two absolutely unmistakable 
features of His message to men are, the actual and 
unlimited love of the Father, and the assurance that 
this our present life is not the only realm of its 
operation. His triumph over death, with all that 
followed, is the pledge of the reliability of His good 
tidings. 

It would, indeed, be a very serious shock to faith 
if it could be unequivocally shown that Nature, 
which He ever regarded as the Father's handiwork, 
contradicted what He thus taught. But we have 
seen that it is not so. It is true we have no all- 
sufficing explanation of life's darker side. The 
amount, and intensity, and distribution of suffering 
often bewilder and sadden us. But when exaggera- 
tion and confusion, sensationalism and misrepre- 
sentation, have been cleared away : when with calm 
discernment, even though through tearful eyes, we 
survey the whole case fairly, we find so much com- 
fort intermingled with the sorrow, so much good in 
the ill, so much light coming with the darkness, that 
our revolt of heart yields to deeper conviction of 
mind. Sorrow, suffering, disappointment, calamity, 
early deaths, remain the tragedies we have always 

we could grasp the entire scheme of things, so far from wishing to 
shatter it to bits and then remould it, we should hail it as better and 
more satisfying than any of our random imaginings." 



64 DOES PAIN DISPROVE THE LOVE OF GOD ? 

felt them to be. But we are driven, in spite of our- 
selves, to own that there is another side. These 
contradictions of what is after all our lower self, 
tend ever to develop the higher. They urge us to 
" move upward, working out the beast," to put away 
childish things, and lay claim to a nobler destiny. 
Manhood fighting with Giant Despair in the valley 
of the shadow of death, is beyond all question some- 
thing worthier, higher, nobler, than the sleekest 
beast that finds nothing to do or bear but wallow in 
the mud and bask in the sunshine. Nature's laws are 
confessedly severe. But they so serve us when we 
obey them, as to leave no honest mind in doubt that 
they are our friends, not our foes. They ever dis- 
close, when we are not too blinded with passion or 
folly to see it, a " power not ourselves that makes 
for righteousness ". They become, indeed, to echo 
Paul's words in a wider sense, " our schoolmaster 
to bring us to Christ ". 

In a word, the true map of this our present state 
of being, is not a black ground with some streaks 
of white upon it, but a white ground with streaks 
of black. There may well come moments when 
the problems of pain bewilder us by their intensity 
and extent. But then a gentle hand is laid upon 
our tear-dimmed eyes, and a voice that carries in 
itself its own trustworthiness whispers — " Let not 
your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid. 
Believe in God; believe also in Me." It is such 
a voice certainly which the human heart most longs, 
most needs, to hear. And when all nature's lessons 
have been patiently learned, they do not drive us 
away from, but rather bid us turn to, the only One 
who in mortal speech has ever dared to say — " I 
am the light of the world — Come unto Me, all ye 
that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give 
you rest ". 



WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 



" God is spirit." 
"God is light." 
" God is love." 
" Our God is a consuming fire." 

" There are some who say that God is unfeeling Law, while the 
Christians tell us that God is love ; there again I think that science has 
decided something. At first sight the witness of science is all for rigid 
law, and there are many who look no further ; yet the right conclusion is 
not that love is not behind, but that if there be love, it must be perfect love. 
We cannot believe now in a love divine which wavers and changes, and has 
moods and tempers. Clear the word of all that weakens and debases that 
loving self-surrender of the noblest of mortals, and you will see more and 
more clearly that the awful sternness of Nature is no greater — and may well 
be no other — than the sternness of perfect love in doing its work of love. 
If Nature wavered, this would prove that God is at any rate not perfect 
love." — Dr. Gwatkin, "The Knowledge of God". 

"With relation, therefore, to both body and soul, suffering is not a 
curse but a blessing in disguise. 

" The transgression of moral law is productive of the larger proportion 
of human suffering in the body ; and although when traceable to this 
source, pain may be regarded as the punishment of evil doing, it is only 
a wholesome correction in infinite mercy for the maintenance of both body 
and soul alive." 

—Dr. F. C. Gant, F.R.C.S., "The Mystery of Suffering". 

" No believer in the good God imagines that the impartial order of this 
world expresses the whole of Him. If He seems to hide Himself in 
indifference behind the impersonal order, Christian doctrine denies the 
indifference. It declares that whether we discern Him or not, He is 
there, the indwelling God, dealing with men in the realm of a spiritual 
existence that ranks above the order that seems impersonal ; caring for all, 
doing the work of an invisible friend, uttering Himself in every instructive 
voice, communicating with every living soul, providing for destinies as yet 
unseen. If His creatures seem wronged by the impartial working of His 
universe, still the deeper truth is that in Him they live and move and have 
their being, and His tender mercies are over all His works." 

—Dr. W. N. Clarke, " The Christian Doctrine of God ". 



6 7 



CHAPTER III 

WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 

The considerations which follow in this section take 
theism for granted. They will be meaningless for 
atheists, profitless for agnostics. But it is more than 
possible that agnosticism may result from unworthy 
thoughts of God, no less than through the usually 
alleged impossibility of knowing anything reliable 
concerning Him. In times when the mind is en- 
larged by the teachings of science, and the heart 
made more tender through world-wide acquaintance 
with the struggles of human life, there cannot but be 
a revolt from the narrow, petty, harsh, and cruel 
conceptions of Deity which satisfied some former 
theologians. Even the Bible, if taken on the old 
lines, and treated as one homogeneous whole of 
verbal inspiration, lends itself to a frightful travesty 
of truth. Representations of God are thrust upon 
the modern mind which are not only in themselves 
unwarranted and unworthy, but supply all too effec- 
tive material for iconoclasm like that of Mr. Brad- 
laugh during the closing periods of the nineteenth 
century, and Mr. Blatchford at the commencement of 
the twentieth. Says the latter : — 

" As for the biblical God, Jahweh or Jehovah, 
I shall try to show from the Bible itself that He 
was not all wise, nor all powerful, nor omni- 
present, that He was not merciful nor just, but 
that on the contrary He was fickle, jealous, dis- 
honourable, immoral, vindictive, barbarous and 
cruel. And yet in the inspired Book, in the 



6$ WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 

Holy Bible, this awful creature is still enshrined 
as God the Father Almighty." l 

Language such as this, or even more severe, can- 
not be truly said to be without any justification. 
Only too many instances might be given from some 
pulpits, from not a little out-door preaching, and 
from not a few " Gospel " publications in the form of 
tracts, booklets, etc., which by their lack of dis- 
crimination between the Old Testament and the New, 
and their refusal to treat the Bible rationally, open 
the door wide for such comments as the foregoing. 

The one thing certain is that the modern mind 
will not tolerate such an ideal. The book just 
quoted speaks in truculent fashion of " Jehovah the 
adopted Heavenly Father of Christianity ". If that 
were true, Christianity would be doomed. The 
writer ought to know that it is not true. But un- 
fortunately many of his readers who know no better 
will take it from him as true, and be correspondingly 
alienated from everything Christian. 

This is precisely what is happening in a vastly 
greater number of cases than most of the Churches, 
with their superficial appeals for optimism, are 
aware. But there are, happily, many wiser, truer 
and nobler conceptions of God to be found in the 
Christian teaching of to-day. Sometimes, however, 
as is customary in human affairs, these go to an 
opposite extreme, equally unwarranted and un- 
worthy. From a God of savagery they pass to one 
of softness. From the hardness and harshness of 
an ancient tribal deity, they turn to a magnified 
modern man given over to laissez-faire. 

Meanwhile the truth abides firm that the founda- 
tion of all religion is the thought of God, in some 
form or another. All religion that merits the name 

1 " God and My Neighbour," pp. 47, 56. 



WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 6g 

may be said to involve three things, an object of 
worship, an ideal of service, and a bond of obligation. 
But it is plain that both these latter depend for their 
nature upon the first. It is the conception of God 
which determines ultimately the total content and 
influence of any religion. " Like priest like people," 
is not more true than " like God like priest " This is 
the sure ground of the claim on behalf of Christianity 
that it is the noblest of all faiths, viz. because it has 
the purest, loftiest, worthiest conception of God as its 
basis. In this conception — to put it in simplest brev- 
ity — there are four elements — reality, personality, 
incomprehensibility, fatherhood. Of these, reality 
is a necessity of thought for which no apology need 
be made. Incomprehensibility is a general as well as 
necessary acknowledgment which calls for no ex- 
position. But the two remaining features of Deity, 
according to Christian faith, do require all the 
emphasis that careful and honest thought can give 
them. There cannot be greater or more important 
matters for consideration in the whole realm of 
religion, than the actuality and the quality of the 
Divine Personality. 

The former of these, we all know, is assumed 
throughout the whole Bible. This is done so 
simply, so naturally, so invariably, that the ordinary 
Bible reader thinks nothing of it. Much in the 
same way as the sailor notes the position of a certain 
star and thinks no more about it. It is a star, and 
it is there. That is enough. To explain that every 
such star is a sun, and is millions of millions of 
miles away, is as unnecessary information for his 
purpose as probably unwelcome. Yet it is abso- 
lutely necessary that some one should notice these 
further facts and their significance ; or else the whole 
realm of modern science would become a chaos. It 
is no less true that whatever becomes of pragmatists, 



;o WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 

learned or unlearned, there must be a philosophy of 
religion ; and so far as the Christian religion is con- 
cerned, its unequivocal starting point, as well as its 
unmistakable basis, is the personality of God. It is 
not, however, incumbent upon us here to plunge 
into abysmal depths of metaphysics such as would 
befit a philosophical treatise. In homelier yet no less 
careful summary it must suffice to say that neither 
philosophy nor science can put a veto on such a 
thought of God. Speaking for the latter, Sir Oliver 
Lodge has recently said with pertinent truth : — 

" People sometimes seek to deny such attri- 
butes as are connoted by the word ' personality ' 
in the Godhead — they say it is a human concep- 
tion. Certainly it is a human conception ; it is 
through humanity that it has been revealed. 
Why seek to deny it ? God transcends per- 
sonality, objectors say. By all means; trans- 
cends all our conceptions infinitely, transcends 
every revelation which has ever been vouch- 
safed ; but the revelations are true as far as 
they go, for all that." 1 

George Eliot's objection that an infinite personal- 
ity is an absurdity, because so utterly incompre- 
hensible by us, is sufficiently met by the reply that 
our own personality is equally incomprehensible. 
But for that reason to pronounce it unreal, would 
be irrational, seeing that the very pronunciation 
would prove it real. Only a person can form and 
utter a deliberate judgment. But what "I am I " 
means, no one has yet been able, or is ever likely 
to be able, to say. 

Again, Prof. Haeckel's crude assertion that " the 
notion of a personal God has been rendered quite 
untenable by the recent advances of monistic science " 

1 " Hibbert Journal," July, 19 11, p. 703. 



WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 71 

— may be dismissed as quite contrary to fact, just as 
his further definition of personality is quite contrary 
to philosophy. " We can never recognize in God," 
he says, "a personal being, or, in other words, an 
individual of limited extension in space, or even of 
human form." Such an attempt to beg the whole 
question by limiting all personality to human beings, 
is unworthy of a serious teacher. The well-known 
words of one of Germany's most eminent philoso- 
phers sum up the whole case, so far as philosophy 
is concerned, much more truly. In his Microcosmus 
Herman Lotze wrote : — 

" In point of fact we have little ground for ' 
speaking of the personality of finite beings. It 
is an ideal, and like all that is ideal belongs un- 
conditionally only to the infinite. Perfect per- 
sonality is in God only ; to all finite minds there 
is allotted but a pale copy thereof; the finite- 
ness of the finite is not a producing condition 
of this personality but a limit and hindrance of 
its development." 1 

Here, therefore, we assume the reality of the 
Divine personality. Being ourselves undeniable 
though inexplicable units of thought, feeling, and 
will, we cannot possibly credit the Author of our 
being with less capacity than ourselves. To such 
an attitude, the words of our eminent scientist 
apply— 

1 " So too," says the late Prof. Bowne in his able work on Theism, 
" we must reverse the common speculative dogma and declare that 
proper personality is possible only to the Absolute. The very ob- 
jections urged against the personality of the Absolute show the in- 
completeness of human personality. The absolute knowledge and 
self-possession which are necessary to perfect personality, can be 
found only in the absolute and infinite being upon whom all things 
depend. Of this, our finite personality can never be more than the 
feeblest and faintest image " (p. 167). 



72 WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 

" Let us not be discouraged by simplicity. 
Real things are simple. Human conceptions 
are not altogether misleading. Our view of 
the universe is a partial one, but not an untrue 
one. The Christian idea of God is a genuine 
representation of reality." 1 

But the greatest question of all yet remains. If 
God be personal, what is the character of His per- 
sonality ? A person, we know too well, may be 
wicked as well as good, cruel as w~ell as tender. 
Personality, indeed, is the source not only of all 
that is best on earth, but also of all that is worst. 
Our dearest friend must be a person. But a person 
may be also our deadliest enemy. To say that such a 
one is a person, is to say nothing, until the character 
of his personality is made known. Is he a monster 
or a father? — a Nero, or a St. Francis? This is 
precisely, and above all else, what we want to know 
concerning God, when it is once granted that He is 
both real and personal. 

It cannot be said too plainly, in these days, that 
herein the Old Testament is not for us a sufficient 
guide. There are great and grave difficulties as- 
sociated with it which cannot honestly be ignored. 
If Christ had simply endorsed its conceptions, Chris- 
tianity would never have come into existence. Nor 
can Christianity now be maintained without His 
modifications, corrections, and enlargements, of the 
Old Testament thought of God. How far He was 
from simply endorsing all that is recorded in Deuter- 
onomy, or Judges, or Kings, with a "Thus saith the 
Lord " attached to it, His own words bear abundant 
witness. He offered no proof of the Divine existence, 
and He unhesitatingly accepted the assumption of the 
Divine personality which permeates the whole collec- 

1 Sir Oliver Lodge, " Hibbert Journal," July, 191 1, p. 716. 



WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 73 

tion of Jewish scriptures. But He did much more. 
Everywhere and always He insisted on the Father- 
hood of God, with a firmness, a clearness and a full- 
ness which had never been approached before, and 
have never been equalled, let alone surpassed, since. 
We may bear in faithful memory all the associations 
of the " Golden Bough " ; all the partial visions of 
poets outside Judaism like Aratus, whom Paul did 
not hesitate to quote ; and even all the loftier as 
well as more wistful expressions of prophets and 
psalmists amidst the chosen people. Yet it remains 
not merely true but the most irrefragable of truths, 
that for an unmistakable and full-orbed conception 
of God as the universal and eternal Father, human- 
ity is indebted to Jesus Christ as to no other prophet, 
or seer, or poet, or teacher, that it has ever known. 
This is, indeed, His most vivid and indisputable 
claim to originality. For His unfolding of the Divine 
Fatherhood is such as to rule out all comparison 
with other gropings and findings, whilst it anticipates 
all questions which might otherwise arise out of the 
imperfection of our human ideal. It may certainly 
be hoped that in our human midst fatherhood still 
ranks high, as a synonym for all that is good and 
noble and gracious. But we cannot forget that 
there are many types of fatherhood amongst the 
nations, and some much more severe than tender, 
much more stern than kind. Christ's own words 
could, on occasion, be very strong in condemnation ; 
and it would be dishonest as well as useless to at- 
tempt to conceal from ourselves or from each other, 
the severe side of the many utterances of the Apostles 
who spoke in His name. So that there is room for 
most careful as well as thankful appreciation of the 
true message of the Christian Gospel hereupon. 
That a real father should be loved by his children, we 
all agree. But should he also be feared ? The general 



74 WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 

conception, supported by practical family life, is that 
the mother is loved and the father feared. Is that 
as it should be, and is that the clue to our under- 
standing and appreciation of the Fatherhood of God ? 

The Christian appeal must, of course, be to the 
New Testament. But not to a merely mechanical 
catena of texts. The only satisfactory appeal is to 
a full and fair induction from the whole, in the light 
of that honest scrutiny to which both Christ Himself 
and the Apostles ever urged their hearers. 

One unmistakable truth then emerges, viz. that 
throughout the whole of the New Testament there 
is no possible divorce between love and fear, as the 
rightful attitude of the human heart towards God. 
"Behold, therefore," says the Apostle Paul, "the 
goodness and severity of God." With that all-com- 
prehensive ideal, Christ's delineation of the Father- 
hood always and entirely agrees. When, therefore, 
amidst the modern unrest, we shrink equally from 
the extremes of bygone thoughtless attribution to 
God of the passions of men depicted in certain por- 
tions of the Old Testament, and the modern easy- 
going indifference which would make Him a mere 
lotus-eater amongst Olympian gods, it is to this 
unification of love and fear that we must turn, for 
such a conception of God as will commend Chris- 
tianity to the sincere thought of to-day. If indeed 
the Christian faith is to come unscathed out of the 
critical crucible, and become, as its adherents desire, 
the world-religion of the twentieth century, a larger, 
worthier thought of God is as indispensable as is 
the rising of the sun if night is to be turned into 
day. 

In hope that a plain answer to the question of 
this section may be some contribution towards such 
a conception, the whole case may here be sum- 
marized under five distinctive truths. These will 



WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 75 

differ greatly from the "five points" of former 
Calvinism, but the difference will be the measure 
at once of their truthfulness and their significance. 

I. In God as revealed by Jesus Christ, there is 
absolutely nothing to fear except His love. 

II. All the wrath, anger, severity, attributed to 
God in the Gospel, are but the expression of His 
love in presence of evil. 

III. In the presence of evil, all love that is love 
must become fearful, just in the degree that it is 
real. 

IV. This severe side of love Divine is real enough 
and fearful enough to move all human nature to 
stand in awe of it. 

V. There is always one, and only one, wa}^ of 
escape from the severity of the love of God, and that 
is by turning back to His love's tenderness. 

All real preaching of the Gospel consists in making 
this five-fold truth clear to human hearts, and force- 
ful in human lives. In such a commission, when all 
that it includes is apprehended, there is programme 
enough to occupy every Christian church and every 
individual believer. 

I. There is absolutely nothing in God to fear, 
except His love. That is the great main unmistak- 
able message of the Gospel of Christ to mankind. 
In the New Testament references to the Divine 
nature — by which, for the Christian mind, the worth 
of all the Old Testament allusions must ever be 
tested — there are many adjectives employed to 
signify qualities, but only four emphatic substantival 
assertions. " God is spirit " ; " God is love " j " God 
is light " ; " God is a consuming fire ". Of these the 
first two may be termed literal, and the latter two 
figurative. But there is a closer relationship be- 
tween them which is worthy of regard. All love, to 
be love, must be spiritual. To represent God as the 



76 WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 

Spirit of Love is to exhibit in the form at once most 
simple, sublime, and tender, what may reverently 
be called the bright aspect of His nature. To say 
that God is light, is a figure which at first glance 
seems also only bright. But our modern knowledge 
tells us with unmistakable emphasis that the light 
which is the life of the physically higher and 
worthier, is the death of the low and the unworthy. 
Against the noxious microbes which we now 
know are our deadliest enemies in body, sunshine 
is a mightier defender, because a more potent 
destroyer of such disease-bringing foes, than all the 
medicines and disinfectants of science put together. 
In this — for us most merciful — sense, the light is 
also a consuming fire. These two, therefore, may 
well be employed to represent the sterner aspects 
of the Divine character. 

There are in the New Testament, as already 
acknowledged, many references to God which are 
at first glance nothing less than terrible. The 
closing portion, popularly known as " Revelations," 
has not only become a critical problem, but has all 
too plentifully supplied the uncritical with material 
for well-meant but luridly false thoughts concerning 
God's dealings with men. Yet it must be owned 
that unless this book be given up altogether, there 
are representations of the Divine character which 
are unmistakably awe-inspiring. The Apostles 
also, alike in their preaching and in their letters, 
unequivocally refer to Divine "wrath," both here 
and hereafter. Whilst Jesus himself, besides simi- 
larly severe references on various occasions, sums 
up this aspect of the Father's nature in a single 
solemn sentence. " I will warn you whom ye shall 
fear : Fear Him, who after He has killed, has power 
to cast into Gehenna : yes, I say to you, Fear Him." 1 

1 Luke xii. 5. 



WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 77 

For our present purpose of brief exposition, how- 
ever, the vivid words of the writer to the Hebrews 
will sum up all these, and give us a statement than 
which nothing can be stronger l or more truly repre- 
sentative of all that is fearful in the Divine nature. 
Cut away from its context, as, alas, too many similar 
utterances of the New Testament generally are, the 
truth that " God is a consuming fire " would be 
terrifying indeed, and might make the Divine Father- 
hood to be but an object of dread. But on fair and 
rational treatment, as part of a whole, it assumes a 
very different aspect. How far from suggesting mere 
terror was the intention of the writer, may be clearly 
seen from two plain facts. First, that this is the very 
chapter which, of all the New Testament writings, 
speaks most fully and unequivocally of the tender 
love of the " Father of spirits ". Then, also, from v. 1 8 
to 23, we have vividly set forth the contrast between 
the severity of the Old Covenant under Moses, and 
the New Covenant of which Jesus is the mediator. 
Thus we are free to look unflinchingly into the 
heart of a phrase which so significantly summarizes 
the fearful aspect of the Fatherhood of God. 

To speak generally, " consuming fire " seems a 
suggestion full of terror and horror to us, because of 
our physical sensitiveness to the pain of any small 
burn, and our human helplessness in presence of 
great conflagrations which destroy property and 
homes and lives. But any such dreadful connota- 
tion of the phrase is expressly excluded here by the 
context. Whether a consuming fire is to be a 
horror or a benediction, depends always and alto- | 
gether upon what it consumes. If it be true that 

1 Matt. xxv. 31-46 is not forgotten here, but its significance 
has been so much distorted and abused in building up a doctrine of 
eternal punishment with which it has nothing to do, that it is best 
not to refer to it unless there be space for fair and full exposition. 



7$ WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 

God is love, plainly the only " consuming fire " which 
truly represents Him, must be incandescent love. 
Can we not then judge from our own small but real 
experiences, what love consumes when it is burn- 
ing with intensity ? At least this is certain beyond 
all doubt, that it never consumes the loved one. If, 
then, there be any truth in the oft-repeated words 
that " God so loved the world that he gave His only 
begotten son " for its redemption, no fire from Him, 
or in Him, can ever consume those whom He so 
loves. As surely as the fearful fire in the hottest of 
our furnaces wherein gold is purified, never con- 
sumes the gold but only separates it from the dross, 
so is the love of the Father, even in its most fearful 
manifestation, working always for human ennoble- 
ment, never for human destruction. 

It may, however, be thought that if God be God, 
enshrined in all the awfulness with which our modern 
knowledge invests him, he must be fearful because 
illimitable in power and majesty. And it is over- 
whelmingly true — as Sir Oliver Lodge has well 
reminded the world of science at the close of his 
Romanes Lecture on the nature of matter — that the 
physical universe is more than sufficient, when we 
carefully consider it, " to elicit feelings of reverent 
awe and adoration ". But before power, even omni- 
potent power, is rightly an object of fear, surely it 
is necessary to know whether it is for us or against 
us. Now, if the message of Jesus merits any regard 
at all, this is settled for evermore. His whole Gos- 
pel is in one word — " Emmanuel ". For those who 
think of Christ as in any sense " the Truth," all ques- 
tion here is at an end. " God is for us," not against 
us. He " is the Saviour of all men," asserts the 
Apostle. The very least that such a word can mean 
is that whatever there is of might, and majesty, and 
power, and awfulness, in the Divine nature, it is all 



WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 79 

and always on the side of poor humanity. A little 
child taken into the engine-room of one of our modern 
mammoth liners, might well be terror-stricken at the 
display of immeasurable force, and exclaim — " What 
fearful engines ! " But the very fearfulness becomes 
a source of gladness when it is made plain that every 
throb of that ponderous crank, every revolution of 
that fearful shaft, brings all on board happily on 
their way, and promises every little one to take him 
safely home. With no less assurance does the Christ 
of the Gospels give us to understand that all things 
are so surely working together for our good, that 
all the awfulness of a law-governed universe is for, 
and not against us. The huge steam-hammer in our 
iron works which at one moment can smash a mass 
of metal with such tremendous force, and then in 
skilled hands come down upon an egg without crack- 
ing it, is but a poor illustration of the infinite power 
which directs the swing of suns and comets in their 
vast orbits, and yet is said by Jesus to be so tenderly 
solicitous for our human welfare that the very hairs 
of our head are numbered. 

II. What, then, it may be asked, becomes of all 
the "anger," and "wrath," and "severity," which 
are so unmistakably attributed, even by Jesus Him- 
self, as well as the Apostles, to the Divine nature ? 
That they are echoes, though modified and mellowed, 
of Old Testament utterances, is too plain to need 
reiteration. If there is much in the Jewish scrip- 
tures which the Christian mind cannot but disown, 
there is also much which it must accept and endorse. 
Are, then, all the strong assertions concerning the 
" wrath " of God, His " anger " against sin, with all 
the solemn warnings and threatened judgements in 
regard to evil-doing, to be minimized, discounted to 
trifles, dismissed to forgetfulness ? Assuredly not. 
Neither the Master Himself, nor any one of His 



80 WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 

servants, gives us any warrant for such procedure. 
But what we do learn, in " the light of the knowledge 
of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ," is a 
fuller apprehension from His standpoint than ancient 
prophet or seer or psalmist could ever give their 
fellows, that the " anger " of God is always and only 
the expression of His love in the presence of evil. 

The poet's phrase " all's love and yet all's law " 
has imprinted itself deeply on the modern mind, 
But it is even more true in the reverse. " All's law 
and yet all's love." That, at least, with unmeasured 
emphasis, is the message of Christ's Gospel to mortal 
men. The most common — and for that very reason 
the most forceful — illustration of this in our daily 
life, has been sufficiently referred to on a previous 
page. The laws of nature, in all their fearful resist- 
lessness, are love to us so long as we obey them. 
It is we ourselves who turn their goodness into 
severity, by our neglect or disobedience. They are 
only crushing when we are rebellious. And their 
general working together for the good of humanity, 
is so marked as to warrant the inference that the 
very severity of the punishment, when men set 
nature's laws at defiance, is intended to teach them 
that they are turning away from good to ill, and are 
making fearful foes of the very forces which would 
be their best friends. Physical illustrations of moral 
truths are necessarily incomplete, but we may well 
mark how the water which generally serves us so well 
in its life-sustaining properties, turns to generally 
unhelpful if not death-dealing ice in presence of cold. 
Yet is every threatening iceberg, all the time, poten- 
tially water. So does the whole Bible teach us, but 
more especially the message of Jesus, that the love 
of God, however real and tender, is hardened into 
anger and becomes fearful when it is met by moral 
evil, or treated with rebellion's cold disdain. None 



WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 81 

the less is the very wrath of God, always and only, 
potential love. 

The Old Testament gives us a vivid and typi- 
cal instance in the opening words of Isaiah, as Dr. 
G. A. Smith forcefully points out. "Because of all 
books the Bible is the only one which interprets con- 
science as the love of God, so is it the only one that 
can combine His pardon with His reproach, and as 
Isaiah does in a single verse, proclaim His free for- 
giveness as the conclusion of His bitter quarrel. 
' Come, let us bring our reasoning to a close saith 
the Lord. Though your sins be as scarlet they 
shall be white as snow ; though they be red like 
crimson, they shall be as wool.' " 1 Then, if we turn 
to the severest chapter in the New Testament, 
Matt, xxiii., we find that even there the fearful 
denunciations of wrong melt away at the end into 
heart-breaking tenderness of lamentation over the 
wrong-doers. " How often would I have gathered 
thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her 
chickens under her wings, and ye would not." So, 
always, be the consuming fire as fearful as it may, 
the anger of God, according to the Gospel of Jesus, 
is ever and only incandescent love. 

III. This turning of love divine into severity under 
special conditions, is not caprice but holy principle ; 
for in the presence of evil all love that is love, must 
become fearful just in proportion as it is real. If, 
as the Gospel of Jesus would have us understand, 
the love of God is the most real of all love, then, 
when faced by moral evil, must it become in intensest 
degree a consuming fire of anger. Yet, may this 
word " anger," and its correlative, "wrath," be alto- 
gether misleading. It is the misfortune of human 
speech, and a sinister testimony to the presence 

1 "Commentary on Isaiah," Vol. I, p. 13. 
6 



82 WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 

of moral evil in our human midst, that no one of 
these terms is really accurate when applied to God. 
Divine anger differs from human anger as distinctly 
as the knife of the surgeon, in his skilled hands and 
with his tender intention, differs from the dagger- 
thrust of the assassin. Anger in a man towards his 
fellow, inevitably connotes more or less of the spite 
which desires revenge for some fancied or real wrong, 
in the infliction of pain upon the offender. But there 
is no more of this element in the Divine anger than 
coal in a diamond — though both are carbon. The 
wrath of God does not desire to inflict pain upon 
the sinner, any more than a good and tender-hearted 
father wishes to inflict punishment upon a disobedi- 
ent child. If, indeed, pain is associated with the 
Divine anger, there are always two distinctive 
features inseparable from such " wrath ". The ex- 
press object of the pain is not the pleasure of the 
inflicter, but the good of the sufferer. And further- 
more, he who inflicts the pain always suffers with 
the offender on whom it falls. Both these traits are 
found in the dealing of good fathers with wayward 
children. 

Some time ago in a northern city, no small indig- 
nation was aroused in regard to a father — a well- 
known Free Church minister — whose child, in spite 
of many warnings, persisted in playing with fire. 
As a final lesson and punishment in one, the father 
lit a match and deliberately with it burned the child's 
finger until a blister came. This was said by not a 
few to be " cruel," " barbarous," ''shameful," and the 
like. But in that same city, in one week, two children 
were burned to death from the very folly against 
which this father sought effectually to warn his child. 
When the sentimentalism of his denouncers is put 
aside, the principles of such an action are as worthy 
as plain. It is certain that nothing but the child's 



WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 83 

good was intended. It is no less sure that the father 
suffered in the infliction of the pain quite as much 
as the child. Whether the warning was effective 
or not, through all the after years, is irrelevant. 
It was assuredly most likely to be, and with that 
the father's responsibility and opportunity of influ- 
ence ended. On the world scale of humanity, such 
principles are even more true and applicable. " As I 
live, saith the Lord, I have no pleasure in the death 
of the wicked, but would rather that he should turn 
from his wickedness and live." In regard to the 
chosen people, can anything be at once more pathetic 
and fearful than the prophet's record — 

" In all their affliction He was afflicted, and 
the angel of His presence saved them ; in His 
love and in His pity He redeemed them ; and He 
bare them and carried them all the days of old. 
But they rebelled and grieved His holy spirit ; 
therefore He was turned to be their enemy and 
Himself fought against them. For from of old 
men have not heard, neither hath the eye seen, 
a God beside thee, who worketh for him that 
waiteth for him." 1 

Or, again, to learn on the smaller scale of our own 
affections how love must sometimes hate, mark the 
young man starting business life with all fair promise 
of success and happiness, his father's joy, his mother's 
pride. But presently boon companions lure him to 
looseness, gambling, drink ; so that the promising 
career is blighted, and instead of worthy character 
developing like a noble edifice, there are only the 
revolting relics of what might have been. Could 
the father's love become anything else than a con- 
suming fire towards the evils that have ruined his 
loved one ? What does the mother feel when the 

1 Is. lxiii. 9, IO ; lxiv. 4. 



84 WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 

home is invaded by the dreaded fever, and she sees 
her darlings go down one by one in its fell clutch ? 
Does not her love for them become consuming hate 
for the disease, even such that she would do any- 
thing in her power to stamp its curse out of the earth ? 
That, on the immeasurable scale, is the true and only 
meaning of the anger of God — love made fearful 
by evil. How tenderly and vehemently the prophets 
expressed this, is too plain to call for prolonged 
quotation. " O do not this abominable thing that I 
hate " — is the summary of the word that came to 
Jeremiah. But the reason of the hate is made as 
unmistakable as the anger which is " poured forth ". 
The anger of God is but love's hate of the evil that 
is ruining the loved one. In the light of the New 
Testament, which is as much fiercer against evil as 
tenderer towards those who do it, the principle is 
illuminated to the uttermost. As the Father of men, 
God so hates evil because He so loves us ; and 
there is in the Divine nature no other anger than 
that which embodies the heartache of His own pro- 
test against the evil which alienates from Him His 
earthly children. 

IV. Certainly all that can be expressed in words, 
no less than all that we see in facts, goes to show 
that the Divine anger is in itself a terrible reality. 
The solemn warning of Jesus, "Yes, I say to you, 
fear Him " — should avail to prevent any man from 
thinking either that love can be trifled with, or that 
the hate into which evil transforms it is a light 
matter. That can never be. The two elements in 
the case can never be either separated or confused. 
The anger is indeed love transformed, but the 
transformation is real. The anger, though free from 
anything like human malice, is terrible in its actu- 
ality. There is overwhelming reason for saying 
" It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the 



WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 85 

living God ". How frightful are some of the bodily 
results of sin, perhaps medical men and Christian 
ministers, together with those actually engaged in 
philanthropic work, only know. If all the disease 
that is due to moral evil were eliminated from 
humanity's experience, there would be scarcely any 
vocation at all for doctors. 

But this is by no means the whole result of sin, 
any more than in a well-regulated family the banish- 
ment of a disobedient child from the table at a meal, 
would be the whole effect of persistent wrongdoing. 
Human nature is undeniably complex, and may 
suffer far more in mind and heart than in body. 
Who would not rather endure bodily pain, than know 
the anguish of what we call a broken heart ? No 
form of physical suffering is dreaded so much as the 
loss of one's reason. All experience testifies that it 
is in the highest realms of our being that we are 
capable of most loss and suffering. It is here that 
what we are obliged by the poverty of our language 
to term the " anger " of God, comes upon men most 
terribly. The pain and loss which ensue from sin — 
in addition to all possible bodily result — do not con- 
sist in something inflicted from without, as a school- 
master may find it necessary to cane a refractory boy, 
but of self-caused alienation from the source of all 
that is best and highest, all that would therefore 
develop the highest and best within us. 

The whole significance of this cannot be ex- 
pressed in words, but enough can be realized suffi- 
ciently in our ordinary circles of home and friends 
and society, to illustrate the horror of that Divine 
anger which involves the impossibility of com- 
munion with the highest. One hears that pulpits 
no longer resound with the former direful echoes 
of "hell," and " damnation," and "eternal torment," 
etc., and it is, or ought to be, true ; for there is 



86 WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 

nothing in all the Greek Testament that answers 
to these verbal malignities as used in modern 
speech. It cannot be too plainly said that no Chris- 
tian preacher has any right in the name of the 
Gospel of Jesus to talk in these days about " dam- 
nation," or " torment," or aught else of the kind. 
Lurid figures from the book of " Revelation " have 
no more truth or warrant when they are quoted — 
in isolation from their context — as literal threats 
for all men, than the Christian hope of the future 
is to be regarded as residence in a stone-built city, 
paved with metal, where the only happiness would 
be to sit linen-clothed in a ring and wave branches 
of trees for ever and ever. But on the other hand, 
the strange thing is that some others should allow 
themselves to imagine that a figurative expression 
is weaker than a literal one. Surely the opposite 
is the case. When we say that a man is as hard 
as a nail, or as keen as a razor, etc., we mean 
more, not less, than if we should simply pronounce 
him very hard or keen. To plead against being 
kept in suspense is intelligible enough ; but a protest 
against being kept on the tenter-hooks, is not only 
equally intelligible but more emphatic. Figures of 
speech come in, we must own, to help us when 
ordinary language fails. Thus to say that there is 
no hell of physical torment, here or hereafter, no 
lake of fire and brimstone, no place of bodily torture 
at all such as Dante's gruesome imagination con- 
ceived, does not diminish, let alone destroy, the 
terribleness of the severity with which the love of 
God burns and must for ever burn against evil, until 
the evil is consumed. 

In a word, the greater the horror of the Divine 
anger, the greater the love it proves. For it is all 
on our behalf. Were it only for His own sake, we 
must reverently acknowledge, God could afford to 



WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 87 

treat evil as the veriest trifle. Here, the remem- 
brance of the universe as we now know it but the 
writers of the New Testament did not, becomes 
unspeakably impressive. This whole world of 
humanity which seems to us so large, is but a speck 
in the solar system ; whilst this itself is but a speck in 
the surrounding space which holds countless millions 
of greater suns, at distances that defy all our powers 
of apprehension. What if this little world of ours 
were filled with Neros — could it affect the majesty 
of the only and awful God ? It would no more 
touch Him than the storm-tossed spray of the ocean 
can avail to extinguish the sun. Elihu's strong 
words in the ancient poem become manifold stronger 
in the light of our modern knowledge : — 

" If thou hast sinned, what doest thou against Him ? 

And if thy transgressions be multiplied what doest thou unto Him ? 

If thou be righteous, what givest thou Him ? 

Or what receiveth He at thy hand ? 

Thy wickedness may hurt a man such as thou art, 

And thy righteousness may profit a son of man." 1 

It is indeed a far far cry from the gods of Olympus 
in their callous isolation, to the Heavenly Father 
who commissions Jesus — "His only begotten Son" 
— to say to men " If God so clothe the grass of the 
field, how much more will He clothe you ! " Such 
words, if they mean anything at all, mean love in- 
expressible. It is for a love's sake which transcends 
all earth's language to express, that God " cannot 
look upon sin with allowance ". No one who loves 
can look on unmoved at that which injures the loved 
one. No parent can be indifferent to a disease 
which grips and threatens to ruin a child. The 
compassion with which Jesus always looked upon 
lepers, was but a pointer to the Divine compassion 

1 Job xxxv. 



88 WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 

which pities the sinner so much as to hate the 
sin and visit it with anger. The love of God can 
have no mercy upon that which threatens degra- 
dation and destruction to the loved. What pity 
can the skilled and tender-hearted surgeon show to 
the cancer which is eating away his patient's life ? 
"Behold then the goodness and severity of God." 
Did He not love men, He might treat their evil with 
indifference, and let them sink unhelped, unwarned, 
unpunished, into everlasting moral degradation. 
But because His love is real, and not mere religious 
fiction, therefore He must and does hate the evil, 
and will visit it with anger so long as it remains 
evil — 

Whilst life and thought and being last 
Or immortality endures. 

V. If all this be true, there is one great corollary. 
From the real, righteous, terrible anger of God 
towards evil in men, there is always one and only 
one way of escape. When Jesus said in this con- 
nexion " I am the way — no man cometh unto the 
Father but by Me " — it was no overwrought imagina- 
tion of a religious enthusiast. We may know it to 
be simple reality, independent of critical scrutiny, 
by means of the experimental test which He him- 
self proposes. " If any man is willing to do His will 
who sent me, he shall know of the teaching whether 
it be from God, or whether I speak from myself." 
The teaching is, that as it is our own known moral 
evil which turns the love of God to anger, so again 
is it our repentance from the evil, our being willing 
to do His will, which turns the anger back to love. 
How and why it should be so, may be left to theo- 
logians to discuss. The plain, wholesome, saving 
truth for every child of man, is that it is so. " He who 
would flee from God, must flee to Him." That is the 



WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 89 

Gospel in a word. A Gospel made possible, indeed, 
as well as gracious, by Jesus Christ ; veritable " good 
tidings," about which there neither need be nor 
ought to be any complication whatever. For the 
all-embracing proclamation to mankind is, without 
any respect of persons, that God is always and for 
ever for us, not against us. For all men, and for every 
man ; now, and for evermore. All the severest con- 
demnations and most solemn warnings against sin, 
in all its kinds and degrees, are not against us, but 
against the wrong to which we commit ourselves 
and for which we are responsible. The responsi- 
bility comes naturally and necessarily from all self- 
committal to wrong on the part of a morally free 
being. Hence it is practically impossible to separate 
the man from the evil he does, with its consequences. 
The man must suffer, even though the Divine anger 
is directed not against him but against his deed. 1 
All the terrible utterances of holy Divine anger are 
not against the prodigal, but against his leaving his 
father's home on folly bent ; as also against his being 
content with harlots and swine husks in a far country, 
where hunger and shame take the place of the home 
and the father's love. His pain and his heart bitter- 
ness were his best friends, in that they brought him 
to himself, and pointed him back to the home where 
love and honour were waiting for him. 

1 When certain popular writers say, " We determinists do not 
denounce men, we denounce acts," two notes must be made. (1) 
Morally and practically it is impossible to isolate a man from his 
doings. A man who acts is responsible for the action. No act 
ever did itself — or is conceivable apart from an actor. (2) The 
thought-distinction between the man and his act is but the old 
Christian distinction between the sinner and his sin. It is his, 
because he is himself in doing it. But he is not his act. His moral 
freedom makes him responsible for the wrong done, but leaves un- 
touched the distinction between himself and the deed. Thus may 
God "hate the sin, and yet the sinner love ". As in John VII. 53, 
viii. 11, etc. 



90 WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 

Thus the New Testament doctrine of " Karma " 
exceeds, both in severity and tenderness, those sug- 
gestions from the East which are in some quarters 
now introduced to the West as new and superior to 
the Christian Gospel. For according to the teaching 
of Jesus, love Divine permits no trifling with evil, 
and offers no hope, either now or hereafter, for any 
man who knowingly persists in it. Because God is 
love, therefore the warning — " be not deceived, God is 
not mocked ". Love cannot be mocked at any time. 
It is too severe. " Whatever a man sows, that will he 
also reap." Only love declares, as neither Buddhism 
nor Theosophy can do, that through the knowledge 
of Jesus Christ, the sowing of repentance and trust 
in Him yield a harvest of forgiveness and of blessed 
hope which is as real in its reaping as the harvest 
of ill-doing. " He who sows to his lower self will 
of that self reap corruption." But also " He who sows 
to the spirit," i.e. who turns from the evil to the good, 
"will reap eternal life ". To appreciate which fully, 
we must bear in mind Christ's other word — "This 
is life eternal, that they should know Thee the only 
true God, and Him whom Thou hast sent ". 

It is thus the love of God which is most to be 
feared. Now and hereafter, the real terror of the 
Gospel is the helplessness of God. That is, the love 
that cannot but hate because it is love. It is no real 
limit to omnipotence when we remind ourselves that 
God cannot deny Himself. The love that cannot 
welcome any sinner into communion with itself so 
long as he clings to his evil, is all the more real love 
for the refusal. Even our lower natures may teach 
us this lesson, if we heed them. For, as a painless 
body would soon be a dead body for want of the 
friendly though often severe warning of pain — 
whence it follows that pain is to us an even better 
friend than pleasure — so is it in the higher realm of 



WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 91 

our moral and spiritual being. The wrath of God 
is really the love that will not let men drift pleasantly 
and unrebuked to ruin. So that if, here and now, 
any man persists in evil that would blight and blast 
his life, it is love that hedges his way with thorns, 
seeks to stop him by punishment, blocks his down- 
ward path with disease, strives to make him turn to 
good by warnings of worse to follow no less than 
by invitations to blessing upon repentance. 

Then, finally, if death find him unrepentant ; if, as 
Jesus said, he dies "in his sins," carrying with him 
his degraded self on into eternity, it is love which 
will pursue him still with terrors and with punish- 
ments, self-inflicted truly but no less real or fearful, 
and will never let him escape until — God only 
knows when or how, and the words of Jesus do not 
tell us — he turns from the evil that degrades him, to 
the love that is yearning over him and waiting with 
love's untiring patience. If love could make love, 
if goodness could compel goodness, if the love of 
God could coerce into turning from evil the moral 
creatures He has made, then would thedark problem 
of the future be simplified indeed ; for all men 
would be saved. But there is no real simplicity or 
comfort in the unthinkable. "Omnipotence cannot 
compel a free being. The whole episode of this 
world's peopling with moral beings is not " an 
experiment without risk of failure " — as one good 
man has printed. For if there be no " risk," there 
is no experiment. If there be an " experiment," 
failure must be as possible as success. But the 
Christian problem of the hereafter is not what God 
will do, or men will do. It is what God cannot do 
— and what men can do. Holy love cannot welcome 
evil into communion with itself. Can the person- 
ality which has here perennially persisted in evil, 
hereafter turn from it to good ? We know not. 



92 WHAT IS THERE IN GOD TO FEAR? 

But this we do know, that he cannot be forced there- 
to. The last vision, therefore, which the Gospel of 
Jesus gives us of the persistently impenitent, is that 
of the waiting, yearning, helplessness of love divine. 
Beyond that, we cannot seek. It is not needful for 
ourselves or others that we should. It is enough 
to get our minds to see, and our hearts to feel — now, 
henceforth, and for ever — that there is nothing in God 
to fear except His love. That love, on behalf of our 
highest good, can be most fearful. And that that very 
love is waiting for the decision of our every moment, 
to say whether it shall bless us with the pain that 
warns us of our evil and its consequences ; or with 
the inspiration, in our struggle for the highest, that 
always thrilled the heart of Christianity's greatest 
advocate — " What then shall we say to these things ? 
If God is for us, who is against us ? " 



WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 



11 Character is fate." — Novalis. 

" Love, wheresoever it appears, is in its measure a law-making power. 
Love is dutiful in thought and deed. And as the lover of his country is 
free from the temptation to treason, so is he who loves Christ secure from 
the temptation to injure any human being, whether it be himself or another. 
He is indeed much more than this. He is bound and he is eager to benefit 
and bless to the utmost of his power, all that bear his Master's nature, 
and that not merely with the good gifts of the earth, but with whatever 
cherishes and trains best the Christ within them." 

— Prof. Seeley in " Ecce Homo ". 

" In general terms it is hard to resist the conclusion that Episcopacy 
is radically and fundamentally unchristian. The very conception of a 
Prince, even of a Dignitary, of the Church, is repugnant to the genius of 
Christianity. How you can have a Prelacy without having adulation and 
obsequiousness, with their inevitable effects upon all save the most 
towering and select natures, one fails to see. Between the figure of a 
Prince of the Church, and the figure of the lowly Founder of Christianity, 
what an abyss yawns ! " — W. F. Osborne, " The Faith of a Layman ". 

" ' If any man will come after Me, let him ignore himself and take up his 
cross and follow Me.' If Christ was what St. John tells us, the manifesta- 
tion of the Divine Word, then He has a right to make that claim upon us ; 
not otherwise. And if it has been found, as it has been found over and 
over again, that in experience the people who answer the demand receive 
the promise, then the historic Christ must be the Christ of St. John's 
theology." — W. Temple, " The Faith and Modern Thought ". 

" The personal factor in religion ; practically for you and me no other 
factor counts. A thousand poets have written on love, but you will learn 
more of love in the kiss of a little child, in the pressure of a kind hand, in 
the soft glance of loyal and tender eyes, than you will in reading all the 
exquisite and all the true things written about love since the world began. 
It is so with Christ. Christianity is meaningless to you, till you feel the 
contact of the soul with Christ. 

1 The love of Jesus what it is, 
None but His loved ones know.' " 

— W. J. Dawson, " The Divine Challenge ". 



95 



CHAPTER IV 

WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 

One of the greatest hindrances to the true triumph 
and beneficent influence of Christianity in the world 
has always been, and yet is, the misunderstanding 
or misrepresentation of its principal watchwords. 
To say nothing about popular notions concerning 
the being and nature of God, the inspiration of the 
Bible, and the person of Christ, which may be seen 
to be untrue and mischievous just in the degree in 
which they are honestly scrutinized, such all-signifi- 
cant terms as " salvation," " faith," " holiness," 
" heaven," are all more or less the subjects of con- 
fusion, misrepresentation, and often direct contra- 
diction. In many cases they are travestied rather 
than taught, and made repulsive rather than attrac- 
tive by their very advocates. Hence it happens 
that when the plain man is asked what any one of 
them means, in the majority of cases he neither 
knows nor cares. Unfortunately also he is able to 
plead that the churches are by no means agreed, 
even in these main matters. Sometimes they are 
in direct opposition ; whilst not a little that passes 
as " Gospel preaching " consists in the reiteration of 
well-worn platitudes which will not bear a moment's 
serious examination. As for clear and unanimous 
teaching, even on the most important and necessary 
themes, the average pulpit seems to be the last place 
in the world where one may expect to find it. 

All this applies only too truly to the first of the 
great religious terms mentioned above. "Salva- 



96 WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 

tion " is yet, after all the Christian centuries, an 
uncertain, ill-defined, unreal, uninviting conception, 
and is presented to the world by the churches in 
terms that are far from harmonious. If, however, 
we leave other crucial Christian watchwords for the 
moment out of account, so long as the New Testa- 
ment is regarded as authoritative, of one thing there 
can be no possible doubt, viz. that from the very 
beginning to the end of the Christian Gospel, the 
greatest need of humanity and the very purpose of 
Christ's whole mission, are declared to be " salva- 
tion". But the words "saved" and "salvation" 
have, alas ! long since become hackneyed and 
hollow in common usage. They are such common- 
places in religious parlance as to be too often devoid 
of all real significance, like a honeycomb out of which 
all the honey has been squeezed. It is tragically 
true that throughout Christendom they have to an 
unmeasured extent become mere vocables without 
significance, sounds without sense, symbols without 
any answering reality — if not mere battle-cries 
between conflicting sects. Small wonder, therefore, 
that outside the comparatively small circle of Church 
membership, the modern world ignores them in 
practice as utterly as the newspapers do in type. 

Yet the New Testament is so full of the teach- 
ing which these terms summarize, that with them 
Christianity stands or falls. Unless there can be 
found and shown some real, weighty, comprehensive, 
attractive, abiding significance in "salvation," the 
whole Christian religion is but an age-long delusion, 
if not also a world-wide snare. Not only has the ex- 
hibition of such significance in these terms been the 
privilege and responsibility of Christendom through 
all the centuries passed, but it is most certainly the 
supreme need of the hour for the greater populations 
of modern Europe — to say nothing here of the East 



WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 97 

— if Christianity is to be in coming years anything 
more than a bankrupt faith. The outlook from the 
standpoint of the churches is, at the very least, 
serious. Refreshingly true and sensible, as against 
the ceaseless reiterations of superficial optimism in 
some quarters, are the words of a recent Bampton 
lecturer, whose whole plea merits the earnest con- 
sideration of every sincere thinker of to-day. 

" When we look frankly at the present state 
of Christianity from these three points, its 
alleged origin L its actual merits as a rule of life, 
and its effect upon individuals, we are forced to 
confess that its influence upon mankind at large 
is, and has been, strangely disproportionate alike 
to its high claims and to the reasonable expecta- 
tion of those who saw its beginnings. And if 
we take a more than historical interest in that 
disproportion, if we still believe that here and 
not elsewhere lies the hope of the world, we 
cannot sit content; we are forced to seek, so 
far as we may, causes and remedies." 1 

What then says this same calm, kindly, careful 
observer, in regard to the causes which he rightly 
suggests we must seek ? 

" It cannot, I think, be questioned that the 
striking contrast between the lives of Christians 
and the rules which they profess to accept, is 
the great religious difficulty of the present day. 
The attitude of the people to the churches to- 
day is not determined by Higher Criticism or 
questions of Ceremonial, but by the unsatis- 
factory lives of professing Christians." 2 
But can any man be a "professing" Christian without 
professing to be in some sense "saved"? Are not 

1 "Bampton Lectures," 1907, by J. H. F. Peile, p. 14, 

2 ibid. p. 6, 17. 

7 



98 WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 

all who are definitely associated with Christian 
churches, such as ceaselessly seek, and surely in 
some measure find, " salvation" ? Where, then, 
does the " unsatisfactory " element come in ? Shall 
we listen once more to this modern Christian 
prophet ? 

" Now it is a hard saying, but a wholesome 
one, that the great majority of" — professedly 
Christian — "mankind have for centuries done 
everything with the moral rule of the Gospel 
except obey it. They have read it aloud in 
their churches and their homes ; they have 
enshrined it in a magnificent system of worship ; 
they have glossed and commented it, till it bears 
a suspicious resemblance to the code which they 
find most profitable and convenient ; they have 
shaped and trimmed it to fit into a corner of an 
otherwise pagan existence." 1 

If this witness is true, no other explanation is neces- 
sary for the "apparent failure of Christianity as a 
general rule of life and conduct ". 2 Its raison d'etre 
is gone. It is in this world to save men, and the men 
who accept it are not saved. There is no need of 
further appeal. Questions of criticismand ceremonial 
are so secondary as to be irrelevant. If in the realm 
of bodily health a new system of therapeutics were 
loudly lauded as being superior to all other, and yet 
those who adopted it were no more preserved from 
illness, no more surely or quickly cured of disease 
than those who rejected it, there would be no need 
of a Royal Commission to examine its claims. Com- 
mon sense would suffice. It does also suffice for the 

1 "Bampton Lectures," 1907, by J. H. F. Peile, p. 21. 

2 The full title of the Bampton Lectures referred to is " The 
Reproach of the Gospel — an Inquiry into the Apparent Failure of 
Christianity as a General Rule of Life and Conduct, with Special 
Reference to the Present Time ". 



WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 99 

modern critic of religion, who is quite within his rights 
when he asks that those who accept a faith which 
has " salvation " for its very pith and marrow, should 
show by unmistakable signs what it is to be " saved ". 

It being undeniable that vast numbers associated 
with Christian Churches do not manifest any tokens 
of being really " saved," no inquiry can be more ap- 
propriate than to ask once more, why not? Is the 
apparent Christian failure due to perversity, or to 
misunderstanding ? Is the non-attractiveness of the 
Christian ideal to outsiders, a natural result of their 
superior intelligence and moral perception ? Or have 
they too failed to do justice to something which 
merited both their appreciation and allegiance ? We 
may leave these questions unanswered and yet ac- 
knowledge the plain fact that with all the preaching, 
and teaching, and singing, and praying, which con- 
stitute the staple methods of the churches, there is yet 
a lamentable confusion in the popular mind as to what 
it is all about. The majority of our fellow-country- 
men are not only outside the churches, but increas- 
ingly content to remain there. For the indifference 
which this attitude betokens, there must be some 
cause, or causes. The lamentable certainty is that 
they do not see any necessity for the " salvation " of 
which Christianity so insistently speaks. Where- 
upon the question must arise, is it truly and fairly put 
before them ? It is evidently impossible to answer 
this in the affirmative, so long as there are such con- 
flicting voices issuing from the various folds into 
which the Christian flock is divided. The world of 
ordinary men and women will never be impressed 
with the advantage, let alone necessity, of " salva- 
tion," by a multitude of discordant shibboleths 
proceeding from as many differing sects. 

Yet the resulting confusion cannot be laid to the 
charge of Christ, or His Apostles. The mistakes 



ioo WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 

which permit Christian dissension and misrepresen- 
tations thus to alienate the people, arise doubtless 
from the various ways of interpreting the New Testa- 
ment. So much must be granted in favour of the 
Romish plea for an infallible interpreter, even when 
the authority of our Christian Scriptures is acknow- 
ledged as final. But of all branches of the uni- 
versal Church, Rome should be the last to assume 
infallibility. A moment's glance at its history com- 
pels us to dismiss such a claim, as peremptorily as 
charitably, for evermore. There is but one human 
way of arriving at the truth, viz. patient persistence 
in seeking it, with never-failing readiness to acknow- 
ledge errors when they are shown to be such, and 
endeavour to make further progress by correcting 
them. That is exactly what is required of the 
Christian Churches of this day, in not a few respects ; 
and one may say, with little hesitation, most of all as 
regards the question before us. It is useless to lay 
stress upon names, or creeds, or organizations. 
Whether men who profess Christianity are Anglicans 
or Romanists, whether they belong to the High 
Church, or Low Church, or Free Church section of 
Christendom, is a small matter. They are all alike 
pledged to offer mankind some sort of " salvation ". 
They are bound to assert that men need to be "saved". 
In days of ever-growing liberty and intelligence, the 
immediate response to such appeals cannot but be a 
double inquiry. The men of the world want to know 
from the Christian Church with increasing insist- 
ence — first, what it really is to be saved ; and then, 
whether those who so strongly affirm its necessity 
do themselves embody its actuality. These are the 
main questions upon which the future of Christianity 
turns, and must turn, amongst millions of men who 
have neither the time nor the disposition to be 
critics or pietists. 



WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 101 

The latter and practical half of this pressing 
double question we may well postpone. It is by 
far the more difficult of the two queries, despite the 
fact that so many think themselves qualified to pass 
sweeping judgments. Wholesale condemnations, 
whether of churches or individuals, on the ground 
of inconsistency, are as a rule as unwarranted as 
severe. As estimates of true or false salvation, they 
are worth about as much as an opinion concerning 
the characters of the inmates of a house, from the 
size and shape and colour of its doors and windows. 
It is true that only by means of social or external 
relationships can we form any estimate at all con- 
cerning a man's personal character. But there is an 
inner world as well as an outer for every moral 
being, and this has certainly to come into the account. 
Hence He who at one time pointed out that a " tree 
may be known by its fruits," at another said with 
equal emphasis "judge not, that ye be not judged " 

It must suffice here to attempt once more to ap- 
preciate and state in language which may be " un- 
derstanded of the people," the essential truths which 
are condensed into the word " salvation ". In spite 
of all the utterances, wise and foolish, true and false, 
which have been and yet are put before men on this 
theme, its unmeasured importance from every point 
of view is manifest enough to justify any endeavour 
to clear away confusion and correct mistake, for the 
benefit of both Church and world. 

For the great assumptions which underlie all 
serious thought about the Christian ideal of salva- 
tion, no apology need here be made. It were un- 
reasonable, even if space permitted, to demand 
proof of everything on one occasion. Some accepted 
axioms must precede all reasoning. Nothing can 
be said about salvation in the Christian sense with- 
out postulating the being of God, the moral nature 



102 WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 

of man, the reality of sin, and the personal work of 
Jesus Christ. Elsewhere, these are legitimate sub- 
jects for discussion. But the New Testament terms 
which are so significant and illuminating for our 
present purpose, take all these for granted, as we 
also must do now. In such procedure, however, it 
may be well to affirm that there is no need for 
apology. There is nothing in our modern knowledge 
to forbid our making these assumptions. The Chris- 
tian ideal, whatever it is, is not a castle in the air. 
Rather it is rock-based on fact and philosophy in five- 
fold fashion. 

i. It recognizes God as half revealed and half 
concealed in nature, but further and fully revealed, 
so far as our powers of apprehension go, in Jesus 
Christ. From Him comes the great foundation truth 
that God is not only the Creator but the Father of 
all men. This involves, of course, not only the 
reality of the Divine personality, in the completest 
significance of that term, but also such loftiness of 
character as exceeds all our best conceptions of 
fatherhood and motherhood combined. That some 
modern thinkers, both able and sincere, cannot accept 
this view, need not be ignored ; but the whole case, 
as up to the present time, has been sufficiently set 
forth elsewhere to permit its rational assumption 
here. 1 

2. Again as to human nature. In spite of the 
verdict of our own consciousness which nothing can 
gainsay, the trend of much philosophical thought is 
in the direction of the theory which falsely calls 
itself " Determinism ". 2 What such a conception 

1 For fuller statement I must be content to refer to my other 
volumes " Theomonism True," and " The True God," in which the 
whole modern situation is fairly faced. 

2 For full justification of this statement see my volume " Deter- 
minism — False and True ". (C. Kelly.) 



WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 103 

logically leads to has been only too clearly expressed 
in the words of its popular and academic advocates. 1 
Here, again, without entering into the well-known 
controversy, we may adopt the summary of one of 
our ablest scientists. Says Sir Oliver Lodge : — 

" The modern superstition about the universe 
is that being suffused with law and order it 
contains nothing personal, nothing indetermin- 
ate, nothing unforeseen ; that there is no room 
for the free activity of intelligent beings, that 
everything is mechanically determined ; so that 
given the velocity and acceleration and position 
of every atom at any instant, the whole future 
could be unravelled by sufficient mathematical 
power. Why not assume, what is manifestly 
the truth, that free will exists, and has to be 
reckoned with ; that the universe is not a 
machine subject to outside forces but a living 
organism with initiations of its own ; and that 
the laws which govern it, though they include 
mechanical and physical and chemical laws, are 
not limited to these, but involve other and 
higher laws, abstractions which may some day 
be formulated perhaps for life, and mind, and 
spirit." 2 

3. From such an attitude, and from it alone, follows 

1 For the former, fair specimens are Mr. Blatchford's published 
assertions that " The actions of a man's will are as mathematically 
fixed at his birth, as are the motions of a planet in its orbit. . . . No 
man can under any circumstances be justly blamed for anything he 
may say or do. No man is answerable for his own acts," etc. For 
the latter, the words of Prof. Hamon, of the New University of 
Brussels — " We ought no more to consider a man who acts respon- 
sible, for he is as much an automaton as a tiger or a rock. General 
irresponsibility, such is scientific truth ! " Whilst Prof. McTaggart, 
speaking from his Cambridge chair, says " Determinists maintain 
that our volitions are as completely determined as all other events ". 

2 " Hibbert Journal," July, 191 1, p. 704. 



104 WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 

the reality, and indeed the very possibility, of sin, as 
Christianly assumed. 1 It is quite irrelevant to rail 
against the word " sin ". Whatever standard be 
adopted, wrong-doing or moral evil involves free 
action, that is real choice, real volition, which is the 
ever-present condition of sin. Whence it follows that 
sin, to be sin, is never merely negative, but always 
in some degree positive. In the Christian view, it is 
essentially the violation of one or both of the two 
great commands as formulated by Jesus Christ. 

4. Such reality and positiveness of sin, or moral 
wrong, cannot be without consequence. As displayed 
in physical fact, it is the cause of seven-tenths of the 
misery of mankind. The tragic list of possible moral 
evils specified by the Apostle Paul in his letter to 
the Galatians, 2 is only too true in actuality and fearful 
in result. To banish these all from the practice of 
humanity, would be to turn this world of suffering 
and sorrow almost into Paradise. But when the 
higher nature of man is taken into account, the 
physical consequence of sin is less serious than the 
moral and spiritual. In the degree in which the 
Fatherhood of God is real, sin becomes a treble in- 
jury. First, to the Father's heart ; secondly, to the 
Father's law, which is no less law for being love ; 
thirdly, to the child who thus alienates himself from 
the source of his being and his highest possibility of 
good. The strong terms employed throughout the 
Bible to convey the direful consequences of sin, such 
as "death," "ruin," "loss," "destruction," etc., be- 
come in the light of history, observation, and experi- 
ence, none too strong, to express what has followed, 

1 The popular statement, as in Mr. Blatchford's book " God and 
My Neighbour," is, " Man being only what God made him, and 
having only the powers God gave him, could not sin against God, 
any more than a steam engine can sin against the engineer who de- 
signed and built it ". (Italics his.) 

2 v. iq. 



WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 105 

does follow, and must follow, when by the myriad and 
through succeeding generations, men repeat the sin 
of David, or Esau or Cain in the Old Testament, or 
scorn the two great commands of Jesus in the New. 
Those who deny the Christian doctrine of sin, have 
still on their hands the whole actuality of human 
misery-producing wrong to explain. Both the facts 
and their issues remain in all their gruesome 
enormity. 

5. It goes without saying that the Christian ideal 
of salvation assumes the historicity and unique 
personality of Jesus Christ, with all that is involved 
in His doctrine, works, character, death, and resur- 
rection. How far the variations of opinion concern- 
ing Him affect the meaning of being saved through 
Him, we may proceed to inquire. But this remains 
unshaken and unequivocal, that Jesus, the real man, 
the prophet of Galilee, the teacher and healer who 
was crucified under Pontius Pilate, and believed to 
have risen from the dead, is the final source of all 
that Christianity understands by " salvation ". The 
New Testament summary is succinctly expressed 
for ever in Peter's words — " And in none other is 
there salvation ; for neither is there any other name 
under heaven that is given amongst men, wherein we 
must be saved ". It cannot, of course, be denied or 
forgotten that in our time, even more than during 
the theological conflicts of the first four Christian 
centuries, there is unrest and uncertainty concerning 
the nature of Christ's personality. But if we rule 
out as unworthy of regard the vapourings of doubt 
as to his historicity, we have left still the unshakable 
Christian dogma that, in some sense or other, 
" salvation " consists in the knowledge and disciple- 
ship of Jesus Christ. 

6. There is yet one more assumption which can- 
not be omitted. Whether we know much or little 



106 WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 

concerning what awaits us when our mortal strength 
is spent, it is an absolute Christian axiom that death 
does not end all. There is a hereafter which comes 
just as really as the present into the purview of 
" salvation ". If, in accordance with the modern 
mood, we insist that the Kingdom of Heaven, which 
is Christ's own synonym for being saved, may be 
and must be in some measure realized here and now, 
there must be no hesitation whatever in adding — 
so long as the New Testament is deemed worthy 
of regard — that Christian salvation contemplates 
measurelessly more than this present state of being. 
It credits man with immortality, no less plainly than 
with moral responsibility. 

These assumptions are confessedly vast, but they 
are indispensable. Questions relating to them must 
be settled elsewhere. Only with these in hand can 
we proceed with any attempt to set forth clearly what 
the Christian Church has to offer the modern world 
in its reiterated appeal to men to come and be saved. 

Unfortunately, every such attempt must begin with 
negations. So many and so different are the inter- 
pretations of " salvation " which emanate from the 
various divisions of Christendom claiming authority 
to teach, that the average man may well be forgiven 
both bewilderment and hesitation. For it is a mani- 
fest certainty that they cannot all be true. Of two 
direct contradictories, one must be wrong. Here, 
therefore, is where teacher and learner must divide 
between them the responsibility for decision. No 
Church can rationally claim infallibility. No man 
can reasonably ask for it. The only Apostolical 
Succession worthy of regard on New Testament 
lines— or indeed contemplated by its writers — is 
that which obeys the exhortation of Paul and of John, 
" Prove all things, hold fast that which is good ". 
— " Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the 



WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 107 

spirits whether they be of God, because many false 
prophets are gone out into the world ". 

Many professing Christians whose sincerity and 
intelligence must not be called in question, will not 
endorse the negatives following which we feel com- 
pelled to posit. For such attitude they take their 
own responsibility, even as we do for stating them. 
The final appeal, as above reiterated, must be to the 
words of Christ and His Apostles which have come 
down to us in our Christian Scriptures. With their 
authority we cannot but define and formulate the 
following denials, in order to clear the way for 
valid assertions. 

(1) The popular notion of being " saved " has been 
all too long and yet is only too commonly that of 
" going to heaven ". This has been unwisely fostered 
by numberless hymns, especially where it ought to 
have been least emphasized, viz. amongst young 
people and children, or the poor and ignorant. But 
according to Jesus Himself these are just those to 
whom most of all salvation should be represented 
as present deliverance, and all the future after death 
regarded as the consequence, not the essence, of 
being saved here and now. "Good tidings to the 
poor ; release to the captives ; recovery of sight to 
the blind ; liberty for the oppressed ; the acceptable 
year of the Lord"; these were the unmistakable 
items concerning which Jesus said to His hearers at 
Nazareth, " To-day hath this Scripture been fulfilled 
in your ears ". 1 

(2) Salvation, as Jesus and His Apostles contem- 
plated it, has neither need nor room for priesthood 
in any form, and is not dependent upon any sacra- 
ment, under any kind of administration whatever. 
Apostles, evangelists, pastors, teachers, elders, dea- 
cons, all are acknowledged as Gospel witnesses 

1 Luke iv. 16-22. 



1 08 WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 

and helpers, but no priests are called for. The ver}^ 
word for "priest" is never once found in the New 
Testament, in any Christian connexion. The author- 
ity and sanctity of the two sacraments is always 
auxiliary, never essential. No man is ever repre- 
sented as being saved by sacrament, but only helped 
in the process of his salvation. 

(3) Again, being saved is never to be confounded 
with the holding of an accurate creed. As a matter 
of fact, no creed ever has been or is wholly accurate. 
All creeds and all theologies are but human at- 
tempts to formulate truth. No number of "divines" 
assembled in any Council or Conference, can ever 
confer infallibility, or even accuracy, on their decrees. 
The history of the great early Christian Councils is 
anything but assuring. Their results were no more 
faultless or final than their temper was worthy. 
The far-reaching consequences of the Council of 
Trent are not one whit more true for being potent. 
To-day, " orthodox " Churches have no more warrant 
for their orthodoxy than a certain amount of agree- 
ment between men whose sincerity and ability is no 
guarantee whatever against mistake. So it comes 
to pass that all creeds without exception have been 
and are being modified. But the salvation which 
the New Testament contemplates, is independent 
of such accuracy. A Romanist, an Anglican, a Uni- 
tarian, a Methodist, a Baptist, a Sweden borgian, may 
all know it ; even though such knowledge may differ 
in fullness and potency. 

(4) Whence also it follows that being saved does 
not consist in formal attachment to any Church. 
There are probably still some few left who are found 
to say that outside the community to which they 
belong, there is little or no hope hereafter for any 
others. But they are no longer taken seriously, and 
need not be considered. When, indeed, educated 



WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 109 

men like Lord Halifax and some others, quote Jesus 
as saying that "there shall be one fold and one 
shepherd," they are false preachers without excuse. 
Not only because they know that the version 
of 161 1 is wrong as to the meaning of the Greek 
word TroL/jLvr), and the Revised Version is right in its 
correction ; but because the very same verse which 
they misquote distinctly affirms that to the mind of 
Christ there were "other sheep," in other folds, 
which were dear to Him and part of His one flock. 
It would be difficult to find a notion more flagrantly 
contradictory to Christian salvation than the bigotry 
with which, alas ! in past and present alike, some 
sections of the Christian Church have contemned 
and anathematized other sections. 

(5) One delusion concerning salvation which for 
a long long time held vast numbers in its miserable 
clutch, has happily so far disappeared as to need no 
more than mere mention. The supposition of an 
" eternal decree " on the part of God, whereby some 
were "elected to be saved," and the rest "doomed 
to be damned," was from its inception to its dismissal 
little less than infernal. The fact that it arose from 
a sincere desire to maintain the Divine sovereignty, 
did nothing to lessen the horribleness of the cruel 
injustice which it attributed to Him whom Jesus 
unequivocally declared to be the Father of all men. 
" Predestination" did as gross wrong to the Scrip- 
tures it professed to interpret, as to the character 
of God in the eyes of humanity. From such a theo- 
logical monstrosity the nineteenth century has set 
men free for evermore. Predestination and salva- 
tion are incommensurable. 

(6) Coming nearer to the thought of our own day, 
we find another double confusion rife. Salvation is 
taken to be the same as conversion ; and conversion 
is identified with reversion. Both these errors are 



no WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 

as costly as misleading. The latter especially. The 
parable of "the prodigal son " has in some respects 
been greatly over-preached, and the character of the 
elder brother so misrepresented in numberless ser- 
mons, that the prevalent impression has been one of 
admiration, if not emulation, towards the one who 
disgraced and degraded himself, whilst scorn and 
contumely have been poured upon the son who 
was faithful to his father and his duty. So have 
young people been almost led to believe that to be 
really right they must first go sadly wrong. The 
words of Jesus to Nicodemus, again, have not seldom 
been so twisted into meanings which He never in- 
tended, that the general inference has obtained, as 
an evangelical doctrine, that in order to be in the 
Christian sense "saved," there must be some great 
change, some catastrophic revulsion like that which 
brought the wanderer back to his father, or trans- 
formed Saul the persecutor into Paul the Apostle. 
But all such inferences are quite unwarranted. 
Such cases as that of Timothy — " my beloved child " 
— who was brought up "in the nurture and admoni- 
tion of the Lord," and never wandered away at all, 
but maintained the M unfeigned faith " that was in his 
mother and grandmother, are entirely overlooked. 
As is also the Apostle Paul's distinct assertion that 
the children of believers are " holy," l or as Dr. Wey- 
mouth renders it — "in reality have a place among 
God's people". In all such cases, "conversion" — 
if the term must be preserved at all, though there is 
no reason why it should, the use of it in the older 
version is quite misleading — means not reversion, 
but realization. And by how much prevention is 
better than cure, and a window that has been pre- 
served entire better than one which has been broken 
and then mended, by so much is that awakening of 

1 1 Cor. vii. 14. 



WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? in 

the soul which most deserves to be called " the new 
birth," better than the remorseful turning back of 
any prodigal, or the piecing together of any frag- 
ments of human "broken earthenware". 

(7) If the Episcopal Churches have erred in repre- 
senting salvation as being something done ab extra 
by sacerdotal authority in sacraments, the Free 
Churches have not done much better in the almost 
universal stress which they have laid on suddenness 
as a necessary element in salvation. Nothing is 
more common in evangelical communities than to 
hear that so many were "saved" on such an occa- 
sion ; and to the same effect are multiplied testimonies 
from numberless sincere individuals during every 
special " mission ". Strictly, or rather carefully, 
speaking, they are never true. No man ever was, 
is, or will be, in the Christian sense "saved " at any 
one moment. For Christian salvation is not an act 
but a process. It is not a birth but a life. It is not 
a special creation but an evolution. There may, on 
the occasions specified, be many sincere and valid 
beginnings, when through personal trust a penitent 
may enter into heart-communion with the Father. 
But that no more constitutes salvation, than a boy's 
entry into a good school constitutes education. The 
new birth, whether by realization or reversion, may 
truly take place at a given moment in a human soul, 
but as life involves a great deal more than being 
born, so does salvation mean much more than a new 
beginning through penitence and faith. Conversion, 
however genuine, is by far the lesser not the greater 
part of salvation. 

There are more reasons than ever as the world 
grows older and civilization becomes more complex 
and artificial, why all emphasis should be laid on the 
unmistakable truth that salvation is a character pro- 
cess and not an emotional convulsion, an attitude and 



ii2 WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 

not an act. It were well worth while to urge the 
reading of the Revised Version, both in public and in 
private, if only for the sake of the one phrase, " being 
saved," which it rightly introduces at the end of the 
second chapter of the Acts, and the beginning of 
Paul's first letter to the Corinthians. 1 It is no longer 
necessary to protest against the Calvinistic doctrine 
of "once in grace always in grace". The thought 
of salvation as some kind of magical change wrought 
at once and for ever at a given moment, has happily 
been dismissed with other well-intended mistakes. 
But it is necessary to say very plainly indeed that 
there is no one stereotyped way of salvation, any 
more than there is one exact contour of a human 
face. Human constitutions, circumstances, and char- 
acters, differ as greatly as men's faces ; and the ex- 
perience of salvation, as the late Dr. Maclaren once 
wisely said, is like water poured into a vessel, it 
takes the shape of that vessel, whatever it may be. 
It may begin with a shock of revulsion, if preceded 
by definite depravity. Or it may come to pass as 
gently and as surely as the young shoot becomes a 
sapling, and the sapling grows into a tree. 

(8) Last, but not least, is it necessary to make un- 
mistakably plain that to be saved in the truly Chris- 
tian sense, is not, as one would think from many 
Gospel exhortations, to " become a child of God". 
For that would imply that the unsaved are not chil- 
dren of God ; which would flatly contradict the most 
definite teaching both of Christ Himself and of the 
Apostles. When an accredited and popular preacher 
of the Gospel is publicly reported, in these days, as 
having printed that — " I do not know of a more 
damnable doctrine than that which is so popular in 
some great pulpits of the land to-day, known as the 

1 Acts II. 47 ; i Cor. I. 18. 



WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 113 

Fatherhood of God " x — it becomes necessary to say 
with the utmost possible plainness and emphasis, 
that this " damnable" doctrine is most certainly that 
of the whole New Testament. Nothing can possibly 
be more clear than Christ's representation of God 
as Father of all men, utterly irrespective, as He Him- 
self declared, 2 of their status or character. All the 
picked passages to the seeming contrary which have 
been too often alleged, admit of, nay call for, a true 
and sufficient explanation on exactly the same prin- 
ciples as are applied to the great saying of Paul to 
Timothy that "God is the Saviour of all men, speci- 
ally of them that believe ". So, according to the 
Gospel of Jesus, is God the Father of all men, and 
the special sense in which His Fatherhood applies 
to them that believe, consists in their recognition, 
appreciation, and reciprocation of that relationship. 
The call of the Church, therefore, to all men to " come 
to Jesus " and be " saved," is not a call to become 
the children of God, for they are all that already, 
whether obedient or disobedient. It is rather the 
reminder of their true nature and dignity, with all 
the consequences of duty, opportunity, responsibility, 
and sin, that flow from it. Apart from this special 
human relationship, unmistakably set forth in the 
opening poetry of Genesis, there could be no thought 
of sin. Without this, men would be but two-footed 
animals ; and mere animals cannot sin. They are 
not made as men are, " after the Divine image " ; 
they are not great enough to be the children of God. 
Sin is the Esau-like scorn of His light and love. 

Having thus briefly, but it is hoped plainly, set 
aside the possible and popular misconceptions which 

1 In the " Christian World " newspaper, from a volume by Dr. 
Len Broughton. 

2 Matt. v. 43-8. 



ii4 WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 

have more or less obscured the true Gospel intention 
of salvation, the way is open to attempt at least a 
summary of those positive elements in this great 
Christian ideal, which constitute its unspeakable 
significance, as veritable " good tidings," for all 
nations no less than for every man. 

(i) The first unmistakable feature of Christian 
salvation is that in any and every form it is the re- 
ception of something — a boon, a love-token, a bene- 
diction, a revelation — from the true and only God of 
all. As a mere concatenation of religious words, this, 
of course, amounts to little or nothing. But when 
rational and reverent thought makes as awful as real 
the being of God, then the assurance of the Gospel 
of Jesus Christ that — 

" This awful God is ours 
Our Father and our Friend " 

becomes glad tidings beyond expression. Then, 
the very familiar words — " God so loved the world 
that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever 
believes in Him should not perish but have eternal 
life " — throw a still more penetrating, solemn and 
tender light upon the meaning of salvation. If men 
were all they should be, and might be, the assurance 
of the Divine Fatherhood would be unmitigated bliss. 
But the allegory of Genesis is fearfully true. As 
Adam sought to hide himself under a sense of guilt, 
so does the sense of sin make the holy Fatherhood 
of God a source of fear and aversion, rather than 
joyful expectation. Such a sense of sin is a general 
human fact — though manifested in many different 
ways — and is only too really warranted. Where it 
is least acknowledged, there is most reason to feel it. 
Civilized spiritual inertia may be quite as unworthy 
as criminal offence. Even as in any real home the 
father's or mother's heart would be as truly grieved 
by one child's selfish sulking, as by another child's 



WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 115 

wilful disobedience. Indeed there can be no greater 
sin against love than to ignore it. But Christ's as- 
surance is that the Father's love is love in spite of 
ill, in any degree. The " mystery of the Gospel " 
is that human sin has become the occasion of the 
greatest conceivable expression of that love. Jesus 
is for all men the pledge of a Divine welcome which 
promises not only forgiveness to all men, but com- 
munion. Until that pledge is dishonoured ; until 
the being of God is disproved ; until His Fatherhood 
is shown to be but pious fiction ; no conceivable bene- 
diction could be so great as that which invites men, 
for sheer love's sake, into conscious, ennobling 
fellowship with the Most High. 

(2) But every gift requires a receiver, and recep- 
tion is an act of choice. The receiver must exercise 
volition no less than the giver. Hence into the 
truth concerning Christian salvation, there must 
enter the element of human responsibility and free 
agency. No marionette, no automaton, can in any 
Gospel sense be " saved ". In the very nature of 
things God can no more save men without them- 
selves, than they can save themselves without Him. 
Repentance and trust, love and obedience, are moral 
qualities which God cannot make for men, or put 
in them if He would ; and for their own sake would 
not if He could. For this human exercise of will is 
an absolutely essential part of being saved, in any 
Christian sense. The phrase "salvation by faith," 
has come greatly into use since Reformation times. 
But it is only possible in a very modified sense. As 
an antithesis to Jewish legalism, or Romish sacer- 
dotalism, it may still bear good significance. But 
the words of Paul usually quoted in this connexion, 
do not bear the stress laid upon them. They really 
refer only to the beginning, not to the full-orbed 
experience of salvation. 



u6 WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 

It may be contrary to Protestant and evangeli- 
cal tradition to speak of "salvation by works," but 
it is, as a summarized ideal, much more in accord 
with the purport of the whole Gospel than " salva- 
tion by faith ". For it is doubly true. So far as 
penitent trust is concerned, Jesus said definitely, in 
answer to the inquiry — " What must we do to work 
the works of God ? " — " This is the work of God, 
that ye believe on Him whom He hath sent". But 
it is after that personal effort and decision, that 
there comes the greater part of " being saved," even 
all that Jesus Himself included in His strong words, 
" Not everyone that saith unto me, Lord, Lord — but 
he that doeth the will of My Father which is in 
Heaven ". The same truth is conveyed in His tender 
exhortation on the eve of his -final trial, recorded for 
us in the fifteenth chapter of John. All that is there 
included is as truly the greater part of salvation, as 
the growth from babyhood to maturity is greater 
than simply being born. For salvation, to be real, 
must always involve co-operation of the Divine with 
the human ; and this co-operation can never be 
better expressed than in Paul's well-known words 
to the Corinthians : — " Working together with Him, 
we intreat also that ye receive not the grace of God 
in vain ". 

(3) The result of such definite and conscious re- 
ception, cannot but be an altered attitude of mind 
and heart both towards God and man. As sin 
involves not merely the absence of good but the 
presence of positive ill, in actual volition, so does 
salvation signify not merely the being saved from 
something, but to something. The usual expression 
of this in religious parlance, is from sin to holiness, 
or from the guilt and power of sin. But it seems to 
need simplifying and putting into homelier speech, if 
it is to be invested with reality. 



WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 117 

(i) As to God, the result is that obedience to the 
first great command becomes not only possible, but 
equally actual and blessed. The change here is 
from alienation to communion, from fear to love. 
The Fatherhood of God becomes no longer a doctrine, 
but an experience ; not a mere religious dogma, but 
a real stay for the mind and comfort for the heart. 
The thought of God, so far from being one of dread 
or fear, becomes one of such ceaseless inspiration as 
is most forcefully conveyed in the Psalmist's lan- 
guage — ■" All my springs are in Thee ". 

(ii) As to man, and the second great command, 
that too comes to be much less a law than an oppor- 
tunity ; no longer a mere duty but a joy. Salvation 
becomes the synonym for the diminution and sub- 
jugation of the selfishness which clings to human 
nature from its brute ancestry. Whence a genuine 
brotherhood emerges, which, if universally realized, 
would turn all earth's Armageddons into Paradise, 
and render our modern Dreadnoughts and Super- 
Dreadnoughts as unnecessary as revolvers at a 
Christmas party. Equally on the small scale of an 
individual heart, or a single home, and the large 
scale of international relationships, it would mean 
the passing from the dark and dreadful list of 
actualities condensed in Paul's " works of the flesh " 1 
into the gracious and noble possibilities of the " fruit 
of the spirit ". 2 Whether an incarnation of such a 
Psalm of love as he addressed to the Corinthians, 3 or 
his ideal of Christian discipleship written to the 
Romans, 4 would not bring more deep and lasting 
good to humanity than the brute superiority of 
Nietzsche's philosophy, or the doctrine that hero- 
ism is found only on the battle-field, ought not, one 

1 Gal. v. 19. 2 Gal. v. 22. 

3 1 Cor. xiii. i Rom. xn. 



u8 WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 

would think, to be a matter of doubt ; unless we are 
all to revert to the non-moral animalism of the jungle, 
(iii) Especially is it manifest that in all its social 
implications, salvation was never so much needed 
as to-day. For, as Mr. Peile has well said — " If we 
could learn and teach these two lessons of the 
Fatherhood of God, to care for others, and put away 
over-care for ourselves ; a good many of our econo- 
mic problems would be solved by ceasing to exist ".* 
And even so severe a critic of the Christian Churches 
as the editor of the " Clarion " says that — 

" Altruism, which is the embodiment of the 
command, ' Love thy neighbour as thyself,' 
seems to have originated in the teachings of 
Christ " ; and " is at any rate in this country fast 
becoming the most powerful impulse in social 
evolution. Altruism, indeed, is more important 
than Socialism itself. Given universal love of 
man for man, and we should have something 
better than Socialism itself." 2 

Such special salvation on the large scale is, we 
know, regarded by many as impracticable — a mere 
counsel of perfection. But the only truth in such de- 
spair is that the large result must ever develop from 
small beginnings. If each man were, in Christ's 
sense, "saved," sociology would take care of itself. 
This is sufficiently corroborated by the writer just 
quoted when, referring to his fear of a German in- 
vasion, he exclaims — " If only we were all Socialists, 
or all Christians ; but we are not ". All genuine 
altruism must begin with holy egoism ; even as the 
second command itself begins at the end. Such 
worthy self-appreciation finds its most real warrant 

1 " Bampton Lectures," 1907, p. 97. 

2 " Altruism," by R. Blatchford, pp. 3, 6. 



WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 119 

and fullest scope in recognition and reciprocation of 
the Divine Fatherhood learned of Jesus Christ. 
Thence it develops into the limitless and practical 
brotherhood which He both enforced and illustrated. 

(4) The true though succinct summary, then, of 
all the foregoing, is that salvation is character. In 
fuller statement, it is the development of Christian 
character. " Being saved " signifies the process of 
that development, through the grace of God work- 
ing in co-operation with the human will, by means 
of life's practical discipline. Its three distinctive 
marks, as Christian character — distinguished from 
ordinary or moral character — are its excess, its ex- 
tent, its method of maintenance. Each of these is 
a large theme which one despairs of putting into a 
few sentences. Here, scarcely more can be said 
than that they are all absolutely essential to Chris- 
tian reality. 

(i) As to its excess, probably the greatest practi- 
cal error in Christendom to-day is the comfortable 
convention that ordinary good character is Christian. 
Yet the doctrine of Jesus is quite unmistakably to 
the contrary. " Unless your goodness exceeds that 
of the Scribes and Pharisees " — who were the re- 
ligiously good people of their day, not by any means 
all hypocrites — "you will certainly not enter into 
the Kingdom of Heaven." The last three words con- 
stitute a true synonym for salvation. But it is con- 
ditioned by the searching question which followed. 
" If you love those who love you, do not even the 
tax-gatherers the same ? If you are kind and 
courteous to your brothers only, what extra do you 
do ? " l It is the excess of goodness in the Christian 
character which alone constitutes it Christian. As 
Prof. Seeley truly put it : " This higher-toned good- 

1 Matt. V. 47 : tl Trepiao-bv 7rotdre ? 



120 WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 

ness which we call holiness ". The Church as well 
as the world shrinks from the latter word, but with- 
out it — as expressing the betterness of Christian 
character beyond all other — there is no real salva- 
tion, and no valid Christianity. 1 

(ii) It is and may well be only too true that men 
in general are rather repelled than attracted by 
both words, " salvation "< and " holiness," by reason 
of the cartoons, if not monstrosities, which have 
been presented to the world too often in their name. 
Even to this hour they are associated with a pious 
subjectivity which is as narrow, if not as repulsive, 
as the traits of character described by Prof. Seeley, 
in the paragraph preceding that whence his above- 
quoted phrase is taken. 2 Modern writers who are 
unfriendly to Christianity sometimes vie with one 
another in pouring scorn on the impracticability 3 

1 When Prof. J. E, McTaggart, in an address before the " Here- 
tics " Society at Cambridge, says : " The men who believe, for example, 
in God, or immortality, or optimism, seem to be neither better nor 
worse morally than those who disbelieve in them," such a deliver- 
ance only obtains regard from the position of the speaker. The 
intended inference is that men's " zeal for virtue does not vary 
according to their views on religious matters ". It is but another 
instance of the " lie which is half a truth," which is, as Tennyson says, 
" a harder matter to fight ". Whatever becomes of men's " views," 
nothing in history, or observation, or experience, is surer than that 
their religious convictions do most markedly affect their zeal for virtue. 
The judgement that they are neither better nor worse, is based indeed 
upon what " seems " much more than upon what is. Even the 
seeming, however, points to a real degree of Christian failure from 
Christ's ideal : " Let your light so shine before men that they may see ". 
But though this failure may be true of the average, there are 
myriads of individual examples to the contrary ; as is fully acknow- 
ledged by Prof. Seeley in the last paragraph of his remarkable chapter 
on the Enthusiasm of Humanity (" Ecce Homo," cheap ed. p. 59). 

2 Cf. " Ecce Homo," cheap ed. p. 58. 

3 Thus Mr. Blatchford, in his anti-Christian polemic, writes — 
" Holiness ! for shame, ithe word is obnoxious. It has stood so long 
for craven fear, for exotistical [sic] inebriation, for selfish retirement 
from the trials and buffets and dirty work of the world." Which is 



WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 121 

of true holiness. But the New Testament is so 
utterly unmistakable in regard to its all-practical and 
all-comprehensive nature, that they are altogether 
without excuse. Quotation is quite unnecessary. 
From beginning to end of Gospels and Epistles 
alike, the representation of Christian character, as 
embodying salvation, is that it must be practical just 
in the degree that it is spiritual. When due allow- 
ance is made for the differing circumstances of the 
first and the twentieth centuries, it is equally clear 
that in these days the practical becomes the social. 
The Kingdom of Heaven on which Jesus insisted, 
can never stand for less than the greatest blessing 
of the greatest number, with all this life's possi- 
bilities of good and without respect of persons. 
That is how salvation, consistently developed on its 
own lines, according to the present day environment, 
leads on naturally and necessarily to Christian 
Socialism. 

(5) Thus, last but by no means least, there emerges 
the final and future significance of being saved. It 
cannot be denied that in the days that are gone, 
Christian teachers without number have ignored the 
making of Heaven here, in their strong desire to 
emphasize the Heaven hereafter. They were un- 
doubtedly wrong, and Christendom is doing well to 
unlearn their doctrine. But there is no small danger, 
thanks to the perversity of human nature, that- one 
extreme should be adopted instead of another. In 
pleading, however rightly, that spiritual salvation 
must mean also social regeneration, the solid reality 
and transcendent greatness of the promise concern- 
ing the hereafter can never be overlooked, and 
ought never to be underrated. 

This much we know, that death is certain, and 

just as false a representation as to say that the Socialism which he 
advocates stands for free love, tyranny, and anarchy. 



122 WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 

apart from the assurance of Jesus, all is dark, un- 
certain, and nebulous. It is indeed exceedingly 
interesting, to say no more, when a modern man of 
science as eminent as Sir Oliver Lodge does not 
shrink from printing the following : — 

11 How are we to get evidence in favour of 
such an apparently gratuitous hypothesis, as the 
existence of myriads on the other side ? Well, 
speaking for myself, and with full and cautious 
responsibilit}', I have to state that as an outcome 
of nry investigations into ps} T chical matters, I 
have at length, and quite gradually, become 
convinced, after more than twenty years of 
study, not only that persistent individual ex- 
istence is a fact, but that occasional communica- 
tion across the chasm — with difficulty and 
under definite conditions — is possible." 1 

But when this, and all else of the same kind of 
testimony, is taken at its best and utmost, what is 
it ? Just a crumb of comfort for those who shrink 
from annihilation. Better than Haeckel's hopeless 
" thanatism," certainty ; but scarcely more than that. 2 
There is no approach to the tender simplicity yet 
immeasurable comfort of Christ's assurance : — " Let 

1 " Hibbert Journal," July, 191 1, p. 709. 

2 Unless we also adopt the further suggestions of the same 
authority : " Let us learn by the testimony of experience — either our 
own or that of others — that those who have been still are ; that they 
care for us and help us ; that they too are progressing and learning 
and working and hoping ; that there are grades of existence, 
stretching upward and upward to all eternity ; and that God Him- 
self, through His agents and messengers is continually striving and 
working and planning so as to bring this creation of His through its 
preparatory labor and pain, and lead it on to an existence higher and 
better than anything we have ever known " (loc. cit., p. 716). But 
this is evidently only the scientific imagination applied to Christian 
data. Psychical science, per se, holds out no such roseate pros- 
pect. 



WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 123 

not your heart be troubled neither let it be afraid ". 
"In my Father's house" — i.e. of course, in modern 
speech, in the whole universe of God — " there are 
many stages of rest and progress." What will be- 
come of the unsaved, need not here concern us. 
For those who are being saved, such a hope as this 
involves is at once sufficient and reliable. The 
method of such a non-material existence need not 
trouble any one. For every line of this page that is 
thoughtfully read, includes a mystery quite as utterly 
beyond science as any resurrection body. What 
we are sure of now, in spite of all our ignorances, 
is that 'salvation,' in the Christian sense, means 
peace and gladness, nobility and philanthropy, in 
ever-developing character. Such character requires 
personality for its realization. The promise of the 
Gospel concerning Heaven — which admits of being 
turned into warning against a correspondingly real 
Hell — is that such potent personality as now char- 
acterizes each of us, shall not crumble into nothing 
at the touch of death, but shall continue to develop, 
helped much rather than hindered by the great 
change. As it is character which after all constitutes 
earth's most real heaven, so the salvation which has 
its essence in Christian character promises not only 
the non-destruction but the enlargement of that 
heaven, together with the assurance of its endless 
continuity. It is true that we cannot grasp the end- 
lessness, but we can appreciate the continuity, and 
that for the present is enough. 

In a final word, therefore, to be saved, according 
to the Christian ideal, is to find in the love of God, 
as incarnate in Jesus Christ, sufficient ground for 
that conviction of sin which is the hall-mark of our 
moral nature ; relief, through His forgiveness, from 
the sting of conscience ; power to overcome moral 
evil, and prove the privilege of closest communion 



124 WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 

with the highest and holiest. Such salvation, because 
it means transformation and ennoblement of char- 
acter in the individual, in being true to itself, canhot 
but spread throughout the whole special environ- 
ment. Such regeneration by means of character, is 
the only hope of the future for human society, 
whatever social or economic schemes be adopted. 1 
Thus the "being saved," on Christian principles, 
would turn human life into an unmeasured benedic- 
tion for all, without respect of persons. This ought 
to constitute sufficient justification before all men 
here and now. But besides that, it becomes also the 
pledge of the worth and reliability of a hope beyond 
the grave, such as normal human nature craves. 
Undoubtedly Tennyson was right that — 

Whatever crazy sorrow saith, 

No life that breathes with human breath 

Has ever truly longed for death. 

Tis life, whereof our nerves are scant, 
Oh life, not death, for which we pant : 
More life, and fuller, that I want. 

Such yearning becomes intense, just in proportion as 
this present existence has been made sweet and 
precious and noble by personal devotion to the 
highest. It is to this worthiest human longing that 
Christian salvation more utterly responds, than any 
other dream or scheme. When, therefore, all that 

1 Thus Mr. J. Ramsay Macdonald, speaking as a Socialist, in 
addressing a gathering of men, speaks as plainly as truly : " I say 
here as one who is in politics, as one who has felt the difficulty of 
deciding what is the right course to adopt in affairs of government — 
I candidly confess to you that I can see no hope for the people, for 
the future, unless we can appeal to the character of the people, unless 
first of all character is established like a bulwark in our midst. It 
alone is the refuge and protection of those of us who have to stand 
for Democracy and fight its uphill fights — often with some who 
should be our followers lagging behind " (Address at the Men's 
Meeting, Leysian Mission, London). 



WHAT IS IT TO BE SAVED? 125 

it stands for day by day is also taken into fair and 
full account, the very least that can be said of so 
great salvation is that it is "worthy of all accep- 
tation ". When genuinely accepted and truly acted 
on, it brings, indeed, such "glad tidings of great joy 
' for all people," as ought to be received with gratitude 
and enthusiasm by every rational being. 



HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY? 



" This much is certain, that there are two highly strategic exercises of 
the Church to which the ordinary man who goes to church pays practi- 
cally no attention. One is the public reading of the Scriptures, and the 
other is the public prayer of the minister. Let us drop fictions in a matter 
of such tremendous importance, and face facts. The fact is that virtually 
none listens. Let the accent of genuine conviction fall on men's ears and 
they are bound to listen. They cannot help being arrested, because the 
simple fact is that the heart of man is eternally hungry." 

— W. F. Osborne, " The Faith of a Layman ". 

" Seeing thus the remarkable place which the Bible occupies in modern 
life, the highest significance at once attaches to the fact that the general 
view of the Bible hitherto prevailing is undergoing a great change in these 
days. Light from various quarters has been thrown upon its pages, 
researches in the ancient lands connected with its origin have been made, 
and studies in the historic circumstances attending its production and 
transmission have been patiently prosecuted ; all contributing to render 
the Bible a much richer book for us than it could possibly have been for 
our forefathers. But it is also a different book, in the sense of bearing a 
different nature." 

—Dr. W. C. Selleck, " The New Appreciation of the Bible ". 

" This dogma of Biblical infallibility is perhaps the supreme illustration 
of the power of the mind to believe not only in the absence but in direct 
defiance of all evidence. It claims for the Bible what the Bible nowhere 
claims for itself; and it has furnished scepticism with its most damaging 
weapons against religion. 

" It is this idolatry of the letter which led so great a man as Wesley to 
endorse the direction of Exodus xxu. 18 — ' Thou shalt not suffer a witch 
to live ' — with the remark ' I would have no compassion on these witches 
— I would burn them all. The giving up of witchcraft is in effect giving 
up the Bible.' "—Dr. J. Warschauer, " What is the Bible ? " 

" This lower conception of the work of the inspiring Spirit, this sup- 
position of a dictated book, every statement of which must needs be 
historically and scientifically accurate, has gradually fastened itself on 
the minds of Englishmen since the middle of the seventeenth century, 
notwithstanding the silent protest of the Church of England and the open 
protest of such spiritual reformers as the early Quakers. It is this con- 
ception which, as knowledge has increased, has produced so grave a 
perplexity that many men have closed the Old Testament altogether ; 
and to vast multitudes, unless some help is offered them, it will presently 
become a sealed book." 

— Dr. J. A. Robinson, " Some Thoughts on Inspiration ". 

" What inspiration is, must be learned from what it does. We must 
not determine the character of the books from the inspiration, but must 
rather determine the nature of the inspiration from the books." 

—Prof. B. Bowne. 



129 



CHAPTER V. 

HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY? 

Any attempt to sum up in few words the whole truth 
concerning the Bible in modern light, involves over- 
whelming difficulties. Such encyclopaedic know- 
ledge is required, together with undaunted courage, 
that it seems positively immodest to take it in hand. 
Yet it is unquestionably as advantageous as neces- 
sary that from time to time progress should be re- 
ported in what must be termed the new and true 
appreciation of the Bible, as distinct from what has 
hitherto obtained, more especially since the time of 
the Reformation. How potent as well as sincere 
this latter has been, must be estimated from the 
two great certainties, beyond all question, which 
lift the Bible out of comparison with any other 
sacred writings of religion known to humanity. The 
extent to which it has been translated into the 
varying languages of mankind, and circulated 
throughout the world, is utterly unparalleled. So 
too is the literature which has grown up in con- 
nexion with it. The flood of books, indeed, upon 
the Bible, not only exceeds those issued upon any 
other subject, but appears to grow greater year by 
year as modern knowledge increases, and, in the form 
of criticism, claims to examine every portion of both 
Old and New Testaments with relentless scrutiny. 
It is a human axiom that every question has two 
sides, and with what rancorous vehemence this was 
illustrated in the theological conflicts of the first four 
Christian centuries, Church history tells us only too 

9 



130 HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY? 

plainly. But although we have happily evolved 
beyond the physical violence of those times, and 
neither the cruel persecution of Diocletian nor the 
murderous Inquisition is to be any longer feared, 
yet there are still two sides in regard to the Bible, 
even amongst Christian believers, which are as pro- 
nounced as strong words and unmeasured acrimony 
can make them. 

We may here pass by as unworthy of serious re- 
gard the militant minority who can see in the Bible 
only an object of ruthless and often scurrilous at- 
tack. 1 Such an attitude is sufficiently summed up 
and rebuked by Prof. Huxley, as an acute and im- 
partial observer, when he says — 

" It appears to me that if there is anybody 
more objectionable than the orthodox Bibliol- 
ater, it is the heterodox Philistine, who can 
discover in a literature which in some respects 
has no superior, nothing but a subject for. scoffing 
and an occasion for the display of his conceited 
ignorance of the debt he owes to former 
generations." 2 

The two camps into which — ignoring, as here we 
must, shades of differing opinion — Christendom is 

1 Thus the author of " God and My Neighbour," who professes to 
be intelligent and high-minded, sums up his appreciation of the " Holy 
Bible " as a " volume of fables and errors collected thousands of 
years ago by superstitious priests and prophets of Palestine and 
Egypt and Assyria — an incongruous and contradictory collection of 
tribal traditions and ancient fables written by men of genius and 
imagination ". This, however, is mildness itself, compared with the 
indiscriminate abuse published under the auspices of Secularism. One 
booklet openly confesses to have " mutilated several Bibles " by cutting 
them to pieces with a penknife, in order to pick out instances of " con- 
tradictions, absurdities, immoralities, and obscenities " and then print 
them side by side, absolutely regardless of any context or connexion, 
as specimens of Bible teaching. 

2 " Essays on Controverted Questions," Prologue, p. 51. 



HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY ? 131 

now divided over the Bible, are equally strong and 
sincere in their convictions, though far from being 
equally well-informed. On the one hand there is a 
deep, genuine, undefined and indefinable, but tenaci- 
ous and indeed unshakable clinging to the Bible, 
as it appears in the " Authorized " Version, which is 
not over-estimated by Mr. Allanson Picton when 
he says — 

"To this reverent affection of whole peoples 
for the Bible, there is absolutely no parallel and 
no analogy elsewhere. For reasons far other 
than those imagined by our fathers, the Bible 
has found a place in the heart, soul, conscience, 
and affections of common men and women of 
the West, such as no Veda, nor Zend Avesta, 
nor Chinese classics, nor Koran, ever had a 
chance of attaining." 1 

In our own country, tradition, patriotism, custom, 
sincerity, and dear old associations, have combined 
with ignorance to make any attempt to correlate the 
various portions of the Old and New Testaments 
with modern knowledge, the most difficult task in the 
whole purview of Christianity. Indeed, up to quite 
recent years, any suggestion that the older views 
must be modified, could only be made at the peril of 
a public teacher's reputation for " soundness," and 
with certain risk to his practical prospects amongst 
Christian Churches. Nor has such an attitude 
by any means ceased. There are vast numbers 
in the " Low " section of the Anglican Church, as 
well as amongst the Evangelical Free Churches, 
whose watchword is " Hands off the old Book ". By 
which is connoted a blind, dogged belief, as firm as 
undefined, that the whole Bible, just as it stands, is 

1 " Man and the Bible," p. 2. 



132 HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY ? 

the "Word of God," in a sense which necessarily 
involves the equal and verbal inspiration of all its 
parts. 

Strong, however, as is this persuasion — often 
quite beyond any reasonable appeal — truth is yet 
stronger, and is gradually but surely making its 
way. Books are appearing, sometimes from unex- 
pected quarters, and pulpit utterances are multiply- 
ing, which show unmistakably that a new era of 
thought and feeling is dawning. And this not only 
for experts in the realm of Biblical scholarship, but 
for the common people, who may always be trusted 
to hear gladly when truth is put before them on a 
reasonable basis and in intelligible language. 

The tercentenary of the Revision of the English 
Bible in 1611 was made a great event of last year; 
and no Christian can fail to appreciate the vast and 
noble service which that version, commonly but 
not accurately termed the "Authorized," has ren- 
dered. There is, however, some real danger lest 
the multiplication of pulpit eulogies and platform 
admiration, together with Royal presentations and 
newspaper articles, should blind us, by the very 
glow of their appreciation, to important facts which 
in these days have to be faced. Popularity is 
generally not far from superficiality, and a great 
wave of sentiment is not always and necessarily 
pure advantage. There are, after all, certain present- 
day facts which must be reckoned with, and out of 
any intelligent and honest appreciation of these, 
there must emerge a situation in regard to the Bible 
which has had no previous parallel. The complexity 
of the case, in all that has to be unlearned as well as 
learned, increases rather than diminishes the serious- 
ness with which it is pressing upon the Christian 
churches of this generation. 

Succinctly stated, without any attempt at the 



HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY? 133 

justification which could easily be supplied, the main 
features of the Biblical position to-day are as 
follows. 

1. In proportion to the population, the Bible is 
less read to-day than ever. It is quite true that the 
rise and progress of criticism have led a minority 
to study the Scriptures more closely, but as to the 
majority of the forty-five millions of these realms, 
the contrast between what we find to-day and what 
J. R. Green tells us of the England of Elizabeth, is 
immeasurable : — 

" England became the people of a book, and 
that book was the Bible. It was as yet the one 
English book which was familiar to every 
Englishman ; it was read at churches and read 
at home, and everywhere its words as they fell" 
on ears which custom had not deadened to their 
force and beauty, kindled a startling enthusi- 
asm." 

The great decline in general Bible reading has 
been timidly acknowledged in most of the speeches 
and writings which have accompanied the ter- 
centenary celebrations, but not with such outspoken 
honesty as the facts of the case demand. The exist- 
ence of several organizations like the International 
Bible Reading Association, whilst enlisting many in 
a somewhat superficial undertaking, does not affect 
the modern world to any appreciable extent. For 
this growing neglect of the Bible, which only those 
can fail to see who are wilfully blind, there are plain 
and sufficient reasons. 

(i) Bibles have become so common, so easy of 
access, so cheap to buy, that in accordance with the 
tendencies of human nature, familiarity has bred 
contempt to no small extent. When the only Bible 
in a parish was chained to the desk in the church, 



134 HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY? 

or when, later, the purchase of a Bible meant, even 
for the well-to-do, considerable effort and sacrifice, 
it was a natural consequence that much store was 
set upon the volume, and its study was deemed a 
privilege. But now that the New Testament, well 
printed, may be bought for a penny, and the whole 
Bible for a few coppers, the inevitable result is that 
that which costs little is accounted worth little, and 
the volume which every one may carry conveniently 
in his pocket and study when he will, is appreciated 
no more than the air the farmer breathes as he walks, 
or the ground on which football crowds disport them- 
selves. 

(ii) Furthermore, the whole mental world is 
altered through the enormous development of litera- 
ture of all kinds. " No history," says Mr. Green, 
"no romance, no poetry, save the little-known verse 
of Chaucer, existed for any practical purpose in the 
English tongue, when the Bible was ordered to be 
set up in churches." The change from such an in- 
tellectual atmosphere to that of to-day, with book- 
shops swarming everywhere, ever cheaper editions 
of the world's best literary productions multiplying 
continually, and our railway bookstalls groaning 
under the growing mass of ephemeral and super- 
ficial publications, is simply beyond expression. 
The Bible is crowded out. 

(iii) Such result is all the more inevitable when to 
the flood of literature is added the whirl of modern 
business. For those whom the law prescribes an 
eight hours' day of work and no more, there may be 
some possibility of leisure, but he must be a pious 
optimist indeed who can imagine that the artisan 
class thus indicated spend any appreciable part of 
that leisure in Bible reading. As for the middle 
classes, who really constitute the business portion of 
the community, any one acquainted at first hand 



HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY? 135 

with modern business or commercial methods, 
knows that there is less and less opportunity each 
decade to spend time in Bible study. And even 
where some opportunity might be secured, the prob- 
abilities are that the inevitable expenditure of 
energy in toil, or of nerve and brain in worry, 
leaves little disposition for any but such light and 
attractive reading as certainly the Bible does not 
offer. 

(iv) There is, moreover, a widespread practical 
notion, none the less influential for being nebulous, 
that in the ordinary walks of life — without casting 
any slur upon the accepted Christian estimate of the 
Bible — all that one needs to know has been secured 
at school, or is to be obtained by frequenting a 
" place of worship " and listening to the " lessons " 
there publicly read. As a matter of fact, concerning 
which there is no doubt whatever, for thousands 
even of respectable church-goers, this is all the Bible 
study that is attempted from January to December. 
It is natural, though from the Christian standpoint 
lamentable, that as a consequence, the actual ignor- 
ance of the average church attendant in regard to the 
Bible, beyond a few familiar phrases, is unbounded. 

(v) Last, though not least, as an explanation for 
present-day popular ignoring of the Bible, comes that 
indefinable but most potent reality known as " the 
modern atmosphere ". The fact that four-fifths of 
the people are outside all the churches, together 
with the steadily persistent decline in church mem- 
bership, cannot but have some general cause. We 
call it indifference to religion. That, however, only 
removes the cause a step further back, and leaves us 
with the inquiry as to why the modern man should 
be so indifferent. The full answer must be post- 
poned. Here it must be frankly acknowledged that 
the mass of our fellow-men do not feel their need of 



1 36 HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY ? 

religion in general, or of Christianity in particular, 
and with such laissez-faire comes naturally an indis- 
position to trouble about the Bible at all. The most 
convenient and apparently satisfactory position, is a 
neutral half-way house between a militant minority 
who attack it, and the religious minority who revere 
it. When all allowance, therefore, is made for the 
quiet and unostentatious appreciative reading of the 
Bible still pursued by very many, and for the good 
work accomplished by Bible classes of all kinds, the 
outstanding fact still remains that this country, which 
some three centuries ago was the land of one book, 
now contains millions of men and women who never 
take it in hand. They are either completely content 
with such confused memories of it as may abide 
from childhood, or quite satisfied to ignore it alto- 
gether. Of the great bulk of the modern population 
of these realms this is true. As for other nations in 
Europe, or America, they certainly exhibit no con- 
trast hereto. The truth is, undoubtedly, that they 
show decidedly less, not greater, disposition to treat 
the Bible as a daily companion. 

2. The next noteworthy fact is that the Bible 
cannot now be read as it formerly was. It is utterly 
useless, even if it were wise and worthy, to ignore 
the immense advance in knowledge of all kinds 
which has taken place during the three centuries that 
have elapsed since the version of 161 1 appeared. It 
is equally vain to assume or pretend that our modern 
acquaintance with science and history and criticism 
does not, or need not, affect the appreciation of the 
Bible. One might as well say that the rising of the 
sun, with its scattering of gloom and fog, has no 
effect upon our appreciation of a landscape. Full 
well we know how wonderfully the methods and 
results of science have improved since its students 
ceased to construct theories first and then endeavour 



HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY ? 1 37 

to make facts square with them. Now the facts come 
first, and all inferences or theories must bend to 
them. In history, moreover, numbers of unexpected 
discoveries, harvested by increasing diligence and 
accuracy, have prevented misrepresentation and 
done away with mere imagination. But all this must 
also apply, and does apply, to the Bible. It is no 
longer permissible, even if it were desirable, for 
men to construct a theory — either in the interest of 
belief or unbelief 1 — as to what a Bible should be. 
The business of the honest student is to do with 
the Bible what men of science have done and are 
doing with nature, viz. examine patiently and im- 
partially the actual facts presented to them. 

No man has any right to come to the Bible with 
a predetermined doctrine as to what he must and 
shall find there, either to confirm or to disprove some 
theory of inspiration. When it is said that the 
Bible comes to us with a history and associations 
which prevent our dealing with it as with other 
books, the plain reply is that such a suggestion cuts 
both ways. If the Bible has been in many cases an 
impulse for righteousness, it has also been the 
cause of the cruel murder of thousands of innocent 
women as witches, and of untold horrors in slavery, 
to say nothing of its influence in religious wars. 
If it has been and is the solace of myriads of sufferers, 
and the inspiration of countless numbers of noble 
characters, as also the well-spring of domestic 
purity and happiness, the counter truth cannot be 
denied, viz. that it has been used as the source of 
the most narrow-minded bigotry, and the ground 

1 Thus one opponent of all things Christian writes hereupon — 
" What would one naturally expect in a revelation by God to man ? 
If the Bible is the word of God, the Bible will be perfect. If the 
Bible is not perfect, it cannot be the word of a God who is perfect " 
— wherein the logic is as poor as the method is unscientific. 



1 38 HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY ? 

of the most bloody religious persecutions. Both 
these usages of this book cannot be warranted. 
If our modern minds and hearts revolt, as they must, 
from the dark side of the record, it is then altogether 
pertinent to remark that all these unworthy and 
indefensible results of Bible study came from refus- 
ing what the sincere thought of to-day demands, i.e. 
that the Bible should be treated as any other book, 
with fair and full scrutiny, and with application of 
the same methods of investigation which have been 
proved trustworthy in all other realms of study. 
The criticism, whether " higher " or " lower," which 
is by some Christians even yet so much feared or 
so vehemently denounced, is nothing more or less 
than an honest attempt to do this. It has been well 
said that " He who is afraid of science, does not be- 
lieve in God ". But such a true aphorism has wider 
application. There is certainly equal ground for 
saying that he who is afraid of criticism does not 
believe in truth. If Christianity requires for its 
foundation either more or less than truth, it is not 
only doomed but well doomed. 

From the modern careful and thorough-going 
examination of the Bible, certain results of greatest 
importance cannot but follow. These can, of course, 
only be summarized here, but they are amply de- 
monstrated elsewhere, and may therefore be stated 
with confidence, just as they must for the truth's 
sake be recorded without equivocation. 

(i) The Bible cannot, without qualification, be 
truthfully called the " Word of God ". The fact that 
this name is so often applied to it even by many 
modern preachers and teachers of ability, does not 
affect the plain reasons why such an appellation is 
unwarranted. If it could always be explained that 
such a title is only a general term, really meaning 
no more than that the Hebrew Scriptures contain a 



HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY ? 1 39 

progressive revelation of the Divine nature which 
culminates in the doctrine of Jesus in the New Testa- 
ment, then little harm would be done. As it is, 
however, the ceaseless and careless reiteration of 
this phrase does double mischief. It plays into the 
hands of the bitterest foes of the Bible, who desire 
nothing so much as that it should be indiscriminately 
called by this name. For they can then immedi- 
ately produce, in sinister triumph, passages from the 
Old Testament which not only flatly contradict 
Christ's teaching, but shock our noblest instincts 
and run counter to the plainest morality. If these 
were in any sense the word of God, the Christian 
religion, as one of its opponents affirms, would not 
last a year. But scarcely less harm is wrought 
amongst believers by the same indiscriminateness. 
For it is thus that the most dreadful and unchristian 
things have been said and done, simply because, 
being in the Bible — no matter where — they have 
been regarded as part of "the word of God," and 
therefore binding upon all men for all time. The 
extent to which this is carried in the name of evan- 
gelical religion, is only too well illustrated just now 
in a volume which boasts of having been issued to 
the number of 50,000, and specifically declares con- 
cerning the whole Bible — as " the word of God " — 
that— 

" It bases its claim to acceptance entirely upon 
the oft-repeated declaration 'Thus saith Jeho- 
vah'." 

Whereas, in spite of this writer's italics, the Bible 
never does anything of the kind. There is no one 
single occurrence of the quoted phrase which re- 
fers to the Bible at all, as any one can see who 
looks with open eyes. Yet in spite of the plainest 
facts, this writer, who boasts his superior Christian 



140 HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY? 

devotion, goes on — representing unfortunately only 
too many others — 

"The very nature of the Book requires that 
if we be logical we either accept it because the 
mouth of Jehovah hath spoken it, or that we 
cast it aside as the greatest of all human im- 
postures." l 
It is truly difficult to speak with patience of such 
declarations in the name of the Christian belief. 
Not only because of the utter falsity — for certainly 
"the mouth of Jehovah" has never said anything 
whatever as to the nature of the Bible — but because 
of the unwarrantable dilemma suggested and the 
inevitably mischievous effect of it. 

(ii) It will be noticed also that special emphasis 
is laid upon " The Book " — with a capital letter. So 
again, " This Book makes extraordinary claims and 
demands upon men ". As a matter of fact, it does 
not do so at all. But for the moment it is the char- 
acterization of the Bible as "The Book," or more 
often still as "The Book of books," which calls for 
notice. The seeming truth of such a title is but 
superficial compensation for the real harm wrought 
by its thoughtless employment. A recent writer, 
who is by no means given to extremes, and speaks 
from the evangelical standpoint, says truly here- 
upon — 

"We have here to deal with the extraordin- 
ary perversity and unfairness so common in our 
day, of treating the Scriptures as if the whole 
collection were only one book. Of all the un- 
fair devices for weakening the evidences of 
Christianity this is perhaps the very worst. 
And it is surprising that so many good Chris- 
tians allow and encourage it — sometimes demand 

1 " The World and Its God," by Philip Mauro. 



HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY? 141 

it. So great is the mischief arising from this, 
that it would almost seem a pity that even for 
convenience the sixty-six or more books which 
form our Bible are so constantly bound together 
in one volume." l 

It would be easy enough to illustrate what this 
writer truly calls the "monstrous injustice" of this 
practice. But the harm accruing from it is too 
manifold to be here set out in detail. Suffice it to 
say that whoever first rendered the old words ra 
fiiftXia as a feminine singular, instead of a neuter 
plural, whether he knew what he was doing or not, 
inflicted immeasurable loss on the Christian Church, 
and paved the way for costly error. " The Bible," 
as we now unalterably term it, is not a book at all, 
but a collection of books which is only inadequately 
termed a " Divine library ". It is really a human 
literature, shot through with Divine influences. 
But a literature necessarily consists of many kinds 
of writing, and extends over many generations of 
human life, thus representing many greatly differing 
conditions of thought and environment. All these 
varying elements, which common sense no less than 
common honesty demands should be fairly con- 
sidered in estimating any writings, have been and 
yet are by myriads of Bible readers entirely ignored. 
They prefer to remain under the spell of a genuine 
" Bibliolatry " which refuses to see in the "Book of 
books " anything other than an entirely Divine pro- 
duction in one volume. This is then to be received 
as such with an unquestioning simplicity, the proper 
term for which is childish credulity. 

Dr. Warschauer well asks, in his excellent volume 
recently published — 

1 Dr. J. Monro Gibson, " The Inspiration and Authority of Holy 
Scripture," p. 204. 



142 HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY? 

" Is it reasonable that we should read the 
poetry of the Bible as if it were prose, the 
philosophy as though it were legislation, the 
vision as though it were history ? It is the in- 
finite variety of the Bible that constitutes one 
of the secrets of its charm — for quite apart from 
its Divine appeal its contents are as many-sided 
as humanity itself; yet a mechanical andundis- 
criminating theory of Scripture has placed all 
these contents on one and the same level, for 
no better reason than that they all form part of 
the same volume." 1 

(iii) The " level " here mentioned is, however, a 
literary level. There is for all Christian interests a 
more important moral and spiritual level to be con- 
sidered. The lamentable fact is that even yet, after, 
say, half a century of discriminating teaching in not 
a few influential quarters, the greater number of 
ordinary Christian people, adherents and members 
of Churches alike, persist in treating the varying 
portions of the sacred literature gathered together in 
the Bible as all alike equally inspired, equally pre- 
cious, equally authoritative. It is nothing less than 
amazing how this gross and harmful misrepresenta- 
tion is countenanced by good and able men who can- 
not but know better. To take only one instance out 
of a host, here is a volume by a writer whose general 
ability and scholarship no one will question, issued 
under the title " The Bible under Trial ". The many 
excellencies of the work may be freely acknowledged. 
Yet how does its commission open ? Thus, 

" I would fain speak a word to remove the 
disquietude under which many labour as if 
Christianity and God's word were at length 
about to be engulfed in the encroaching waves 

1 « What is the Bible ? " p. 25. 



HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY? 143 

of scepticism. No such consequence as this 
is going to follow. ' The word of the Lord,' 
the Psalm says, 'is tried.' Again, 'The words 
of the Lord are pure words ; as silver tried in a 
furnace on the earth, purified seven times '. 
The Bible least of all need shrink from this 
ordeal of trial, nor does it." 

Here, once more, we see that without any quali- 
fication the Bible is declared to be "God's word," 
and certain picked utterances from one portion of it, 
are not only made to apply to the whole collection 
of writings in both the Old and New Testaments — 
which is manifestly impossible — but the whole 
heterogeneous contents of both Hebrew and Chris- 
tian Scriptures are taken en bloc, as sufficiently de- 
scribed by the affirmation that " God's word has 
been a tried word in all ages " ! It is simply impos- 
sible to estimate the loss and mischief which accrue 
to the Christian Church and to the kingdom of 
Christ amongst men, from this utterly untrue, un- 
warranted, and superficial lumping together of writ- 
ings immeasurably different in every respect, under 
a plea that they were each and all integral parts of 
" God's word ". The results have, in very deed, 
been calamitous and irremediable. To it have been 
due the fearful conceptions of God which have been 
so saddled upon Christianity as to drive numbers of 
thoughtful men into utter unbelief; to it must be 
attributed the ghastly horrors that defile Church 
history, perpetrated by sincere believers ; from it 
were drawn the polygamous sanctions of Mormonism, 
no less than the opposition of Christian bishops in 
the House of Lords to marriage with a deceased 
wife's sister ; to it must be traced, in general, by far 
the greater part of those popular misconceptions of 
Christian truth and duty which still so seriously 
hinder the progress of Christ's true Gospel in our 



i 4 4 HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY? 

modern world. The bondage of the Levitical law of 
"commandments contained in ordinances," from 
which all the genius and devotion of Paul scarcely 
availed to save the early Church, has been repeated 
since the Reformation in a mechanical theory of 
Biblical inspiration which demanded equal apprecia- 
tion, reverence, and obedience, for all parts of the 
Bible alike, and so sought to bind on the Christian 
conscience a yoke which neither our Puritan fathers 
nor we are able to bear. It can, therefore, never be 
said too plainly that for the Christian believer, the 
Old Testament is always and only of such value as 
Christ puts upon it, and that all its vastly varying 
portions must be tested for acceptance or rejection 
by His canons of truth, and by the spirit which we 
learn from Him. 

(iv) At the root of the costly errors which repre- 
sented the Bible as one book equally binding in all 
its parts, lay the great foundation mistake known as 
" verbal inspiration ". Although discarded now by 
all the more thoughtful in the Churches, it is by no 
means wholly defunct. In sporadic fashion it is 
continually reappearing. As when quite recently the 
well-known London pastor of an influential church 
openly claimed that " all his success had been due 
to his acceptance of the Bible as verbally inspired, 
the veritable word of God, just as it stands," i.e. in 
the version of 1611. To this school also belong all 
those — and they are by no means few — who repeat 
on every possible occasion that they believe in " the 
whole Bible from back to back," and refer to the 
higher criticism as " The indiscreet nonsense talked 
by prominent insiders to whom human nature and 
the wisdom of man are more reliable than the Book 
which is itself the word of the living God V Such 

1 The writer of this sentence also affirms that " the allegory and 
picture theories of Genesis are so much clever nonsense. There is 



HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY? 145 

deliverances would be only pitiful if they were not 
also influential, and that amongst the young and un- 
educated who most need true guidance in these times 
of unrest. It must, however, be said with all possible 
plainness and emphasis that this is not true guidance. 
The theory of inspiration which involves that 

" every book, chapter, paragraph, verse, sent- 
ence, clause, phrase and word, are the direct 
gift of God to the children of men, and the 
whole Bible is the veritable word of God so that 
all portions of it are of equal value and authority 
and whoever denies any single part of it, virtu- 
ally denies it entirely, while whoever accepts 
any part of it, is under obligation to accept 
it all " 

may be the view which has dominated the theology 
of Protestantism for the last three centuries, and 
still practically prevails throughout the rank and 
file of the Evangelical Churches. Nevertheless, it 
is so demonstrably untrue, and fraught with im- 
measurable harm, that it must be earnestly opposed 
by every one who believes in the sacredness of 
truth, and desires the better appreciation of the Bible, 
(v) The same must be said in regard to the twin 
fallacy which is practically inseparable from the pre- 
ceding, viz. that which is known as the " inerrancy " 
of the Bible. One wonders how such a notion could 
ever be promulgated amongst people permitted to 

no trace of any such thing as evolution in God's creation. Hence 
we believe that the Genesis account of creation and the fall of man 
will be held closely to the hearts of multitudes when Darwin's 
doctrine has been consigned to the limbo of exploded scientific 
fallacies." That such utterances can come from the pen of a well- 
known and highly popular Wesleyan minister, who is doing his utmost 
to enforce them throughout the country, shows how great is still the 
need for rational teaching on this important theme in modern Chris- 
tian Churches. 

10 



146 HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY? 

read this religious literature for themselves. But 
when once a theory has hold of the popular mind, 
it seems to be invulnerable. This particular doctrine 
of complete "Biblical infallibility" is so especially 
open to disproof, that the tenacity with which it has 
been maintained and the timid hesitation with which 
the contrary is now beginning to be admitted by the 
average Christian, are truly amazing. It were a 
thankless and unnecessary task, impossible here, to 
enumerate in detail the unmistakable errors, and 
contradictions, and discrepancies, as well as definite 
mistakes in history, and statements utterly irrecon- 
cilable with science, to say nothing of gross exaggera- 
tions in numbers and conceptions of God and morality 
for ever impossible to the Christian mind, which are 
found in the Old Testament. In themselves they 
are quite harmless. A real and reasonable appre- 
ciation of the Scriptures is no more disturbed by 
them, than is a man's enjoyment of a summer's day 
by the knowledge that there are real spots on the 
sun. On the other hand, no Christian mistake what- 
ever has given such opportunity to opponents as 
this. It is so easy to get the sincere but uninstructed 
believer to pledge his faith to the infallibility of the 
11 Book of books," and then adduce a crop of small 
errors as a triumphant nemesis. Happily the truth 
in this respect is spreading, in spite of the vehement 
appeals of those who call themselves members of a 
" Bible League," and mean so well whilst they do 
so ill. 

All these five items combine to show that the 
Bible cannot to-day be read as it has hitherto been 
by multitudes of devout believers. To very many 
this will seem sad loss, and it will be difficult to 
show them that it is most real gain. 

3. Although it is not necessary here to describe 
in detail the kinds and degrees of definite modern 



HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY? 147 

attacks upon the Bible, it must be remembered that 
there are such ; and they are by no means so unin- 
fluential as Christian Churches comfortably assume. 
It is true that the former virulence which character- 
ized the onslaughts of Thomas Paine, Charles Brad- 
laugh, and Colonel Ingersoll, has largely disappeared, 
thanks to the " criticism " which has shown that their 
attacks were misdirected. But relics of the old spirit 
sometimes appear, and where the former theories of 
inspiration are maintained, they are still as mis- 
chievous as unanswerable. As a rule, however, the 
worst that they can be now said to accomplish, is to 
help to make the bulk of the people content without 
considering the Bible at all. 

4. No one can question that as in many other 
respects, so in regard to the Bible, we are passing 
through times of transition. It is as vain to deny as 
useless to resist the tendencies to change which are 
working in modern thought everywhere. On the 
whole they are making for genuine progress. But 
during any period of transition, especially in religion, 
some amount of confusion, not to say panic, is in- 
evitable. All that can be done is to persist patiently 
in maintaining ascertained truth against what is 
mostly, if not merely, traditional. So far as the 
Bible is concerned, the people of these realms are 
to-day certainly far removed from the "people of 
one book " who lived in the time of Cromwell. But 
Puritan England was by no means Paradise. Our 
Puritan forefathers, however noble in many respects, 
were assuredly not perfect. They misunderstood 
the Bible as greatly as they revered it. Under the 
influence of their theology with its cast-iron theory 
of inspiration, they attempted what was not only in 
itself impossible but was directly and emphatically 
forbidden by Christ Himself, viz. to put the Old 
Covenant on a level with the New, and make the 



148 HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY? 

ideals, customs, laws of the Pentateuch to be abiding 
institutions for all generations of humanity. The 
disastrous extent of their failure may be fairly esti- 
mated from the reaction which swept through the 
country with the return of Charles the Second. 

For all its good qualities, Puritanism was a hard 
and bitter yoke, even for one country during a short 
period. For mankind at large, in perpetuity, it would 
be simply intolerable. And not only naturally but 
divinely so. For it was a mistake, and mistakes are 
as contrary to the will of God as to the weal of man. 
Seventeenth century believers were indeed reverent 
enough and sincere enough. But neither reverence 
nor sincerity, nor both combined, are sufficient as 
exponents of the truth in general, and certainly not 
of the Bible in particular. That element is lacking 
upon which Paul, in the very midst of his fervour and 
devotion, laid such stress — " What is it then, I will 
pray with the spirit, I will pray with the understand- 
ing also — in the Church I had rather speak five 
words with my understanding, than ten thousand 
words in an unknown tongue ". The duty and privi- 
lege of modern Christianity is to supply the element 
of understanding which the Puritans lacked. In 
regard to the matter before us, their lack was inevit- 
able. In the absence of the knowledge which could 
only come to us after three centuries of investigation, 
their convictions were strong enough — so strong 
that we have by no means shaken them off yet. But 
they were not true ; and the time for their modifica- 
tion or removal has come. The period of transition 
is on us. All such periods are times of difficulty, 
when there is even more need of patience than of 
zeal. When men's minds are unsettled through the 
changing of long-established notions ; when convic- 
tions which have been as dear as strong are seen to 
be mistaken ; when beliefs which were deemed 



HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY? 149 

absolutely and for ever beyond question are openly 
and emphatically denied ; it is inevitable that con- 
fusion should arise, and with the confusion comes 
fear, and out of the fear grows bitterness. At such 
a time and in the midst of such surroundings, pious 
platitudes are useless. To suppose that the modern 
seething sea of questionings will be lulled into peace 
by whispering over it a few words from the Old 
Testament which have no connexion with it what- 
ever, and declaring that "the river of God is full of 
water," 1 is sheer fatuity. It was Christ Himself 
who rebuked His contemporaries for not discerning 
the signs of their times. It is He, not any "pessi- 
mist" or "alarmist," who bids us be "wise as 
serpents " no less than sincere as doves. 

Such a maxim truly applies to everything, but 
here we are concerned only with the Bible. It is 
as certain that the old appreciation is passing away 
as it is that the new appreciation is not yet really 
come. But it is coming; in spite of all the opposi- 
tion of believers and the maledictions of unbelievers. 
What ought to be and what might be throughout 
the churches, has been recently well expressed by 
a veteran Christian teacher of deservedly world- 
wide reputation, whose modest volume — " Sixty 
Years with the Bible " — ought to be carefully 
studied by all schools of Christian thinkers. Only 
a summarising sentence can be given here : — 

" In the history I have found the new light 
making much intelligible that was once confused, 
and much credible that was once hard to be- 
lieve. Thus the modern method has come to 
me not mainly as a perplexing thing, though of 

1 This is what was actually done at the Wesleyan Conference of 
191 1, when a member of it pointed out the urgent need for frankly 
facing the whole modern situation. 



150 HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY ? 

course it has brought perplexity now and then, 
but far more as a means of light and help." 1 

If, however, similar testimony from an equally well- 
known preacher in this country be desired, Dr. 
Monro Gibson's words are to the same effect. Re- 
ferring to his becoming acquainted with critical 
views of the Old Testament, he says — 

" It was in this way that I came out of the 
comparative darkness into better light ; and it 
is in the hope that I may help some others into 
the same clear and unclouded conviction of the 
inspiration and authority of the sacred Scrip- 
tures, that I try in this book to show the im- 
mense gains which have come from the frank 
recognition of all the facts before us, instead of 
first settling our theory and then trying to 
force the facts to fit into it." 2 

5. Such an attitude, at once reasonable, reverent, 
true to facts, well warranted in principle, and bene- 
ficial in result, is however too good to be true at 
present either for the bulk of believers or for most 
unbelievers. As Dr. W. N. Clarke further re- 
marks — 

" The chief danger about the Bible at present, 
is that on the one hand it will be studied too 
much in the mere spirit of criticism, without 
regard to its religious value, and on the other 
that the timidity of Christian people on critical 
grounds will prevent them from holding that 
religious value in its true rank and place." 3 

The general situation to-day is that believers are 
afraid of the results of modern knowledge. Thus 



1 " Sixty Years with the Bible," p. 184. 

2 " The Inspiration and Authority of Holy Scripture," p. 9. 

3 p. 254. 



HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY ? 151 

they are partly shaken in their estimate of the Bible, 
and partly disposed to cling blindly to it or fight 
for it irrespective of what is true ; whilst unbelievers 
are giving themselves to proleptic boastings that 
now, at last, the Bible is being dethroned from its 
place in the affections of the Church and its hold 
upon the mind of the world. There is thus no 
small danger of its being increasingly ignored. It 
is certainly less read at home by ordinary Christians. 
It is less employed in day schools ; whence also 
there is every probability that clerical bigotry will 
eventually drive it out altogether. In Sunday 
schools it is very little taught at best, because of 
the limits of time. In many cases that little is both 
badly taught, and mistakenly. Speaking as carefully 
as generally, and when all allowance has been made 
for some excellent institutions for Bible reading, 
the world of to-day, even in Great Britain, has less 
time, less felt need, less disposition to pay serious 
attention to the Bible, than ever before since it was 
an open book in our language. It may be easy for 
some religious optimists to dispute this estimate. 
But they do not and cannot alter the facts of daily 
life upon which it is only too surely based. 

6. There is no fear that the Bible will wholly lose 
its influence. But it is doing so to some real ex- 
tent at present. For a while, at least, the unsettling- 
process must go on, though how long it will be loss 
rather than gain, will be for Christian Churches and 
their teachers to decide. Meanwhile, there is the 
danger of loss both real and great to the present 
generation. For when all the attacks upon Chris- 
tianity " through the sides of Judaism " have spent 
themselves, and all the harsh indictments and coarse 
diatribes of some opponents have been uttered, 
there yet remains the witness of history, of ex- 
perience, and of observation, as to the influence of 



1 52 HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY ? 

the Bible for good upon men and nations alike. 
The deliberate and impartial words of Mr. J. R. 
Green, in his well-known history, bearing upon 
this, deserve to be remembered : — 

" But far greater than its effect upon literature 
or social phrase, was the effect of the Bible on 
the character of the people at large. Elizabeth 
might silence or tune the pulpits, but it was 
impossible for her to silence or tune the great 
preachers of justice, and mercy, and truth, who 
spoke from the Book which she had again 
opened for her people. The whole moral 
effect which is produced nowadays by the 
religious newspaper, the tract, the essay, the 
lecture, the missionary report, the sermon, was 
then produced by the Bible alone. And its 
effect in this way, however dispassionately we 
examine it, was simply amazing. The whole 
temper of the nation was changed. A new 
conception of life and of man superseded the 
old. A new moral and religious impulse spread 
through every class." 1 

To an extent that cannot be measured, that effect 
yet remains. There has certainly 'been a minority, 
alert, vigorous, implacable, who have denied this 
good effect, and in strongest language have sought 
to discredit the Bible altogether. 2 But when all 

1 " Short History of England," p. 449. 

2 As it may be well for the ordinary reader to have a specimen of 
the kind of estimate which is now more than ever before circulated 
by means of the cheap press, take the following : "I hold a high 
opinion of the literary quality of some parts of the Old Testament ; 
but I seriously think that the loss of the first fourteen books would 
be a distinct gain to the world. Count up the terrible losses in the 
many religious wars of the world, add in all the massacres, the 
martyrdoms, the tortures for religion's sake ; put to the sum the 
long tale of witchcraft murders ; remember what slavery has been ; 
and then ask yourselves whether the Book of books deserves all the 



HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY? 153 

such opposition is fairly faced, there is nothing in 
it to warrant any fear that the influence of the Bible 
is drawing to a close. All that it signifies is that a 
new appreciation, based on a better understanding 
of this whole sacred literature, is demanded. To 
such, sooner or later, modern Christian Churches 
will certainly have to come. Sincerity in believing 
the Bible "just as it stands" to be "the word of 
God," is nothing to the point. For Mussulmans 
with equal sincerity so regard their Koran ; Budd- 
hists their Tripitaka ; Mormons the golden plates of 
Joe Smith ; and Eddyists the weird conglomeration 
known as " Science and Health with a key to the 
Scriptures ". Nor is old association sufficient plea 
for rejecting the new knowledge. Peter had to 
learn that lesson, before he could avow that God 
had taught him " not to call any man common or un- 
clean ". The Bereans are pronounced " more noble," 
because for the truth's sake they set old associa- 
tions at defiance. 1 If long-established convictions 
are to be held as even stronger than old associations, 
we have Paul's solemn declaration before Agrippa, 2 
that for the sake of new truth he had given up his 

eulogy that has been laid upon it. I believe that to-day all manner 
of evil passions are fostered, and all the finer motions of the human 
spirit are retarded by the habit of reading those savage old books of 
the Jews as the word of God. I do not think the Bible in its present 
form is a fit book to place in the hands of children, and it is 
certainly not a fit book to send out for the salvation of savage and 
ignorant people." It is easy for the average complacent believer to 
regard this kind of print with pious horror, but he ought to face two 
facts. First, that it is multiplying to an extent of which ordinary 
Church members know nothing. Secondly, that there is some truth 
in it which cannot in these days be any longer hushed up. For an 
excellent specimen as to how the Old Testament ought to be and 
may be set before our young people, see "Old Testament Stories 
in Modern Light— A Bible Guide for the Young," by T. Rhondda 
Williams (Jas. Clarke). On such lines, and on no other, will the 
Bible teaching of the future have to proceed. 

2 Acts xvii. 11. 2 Acts xxvi. o. 



1 54 HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY ? 

earliest and strongest beliefs. Thus we are reminded 
that so long as reason lasts and any belief at all is 
worth holding, the crucial question as to Scripture 
is that propounded to the eunuch by Philip — 
" Understandest thou what thou readest ? " With- 
out understanding, the Bible becomes merely the 
fetish of the Bibliolater. 

7. Meanwhile the main features of the situation 
which have now to be faced by all professing Chris- 
tians are as follows : — 

(i) All that is of force in the current objections to 
the Bible, is due to the mistaken handling of it by 
its friends. Far too long it has been interpreted in 
a way that is quite unnatural, unwarranted, untrue. 
Proper inquiry into the times and circumstances of 
each writer has been forbidden. The actual facts of 
the case have been ignored. Commands that were 
temporary and precepts that were only adapted to 
special surroundings, have been exalted into world- 
wide and eternal obligations. Standards of morality 
fitted only for a fraction of mankind in a low grade 
of civilization, have been proclaimed universal and 
abiding. Passages of Scripture, and even sentences, 
have been wrenched from their contexts, invested 
with meanings they never contained, and held up as 
unlimited threats or promises for all men during all 
time. It is small wonder that modern intelligence 
should turn upon such methods with indignation, 
or that the truly Christian spirit should demand to be 
set free from such irrational bondage. The tyranny 
of preconceived theories of inspiration, whether 
verbal or plenary, has been as bad as other tyrannies, 
and fraught with corresponding evil consequences. 
But it has had its day, and must now throughout the 
Churches cease to be. The enemies of the Bible must 
be given to understand that this their favourite and 
almost only effective weapon, is henceforth moribund. 



HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY? 155 

(ii) One of the greatest marvels in religious history 
is that in spite of all the mistaken and mischievous 
views concerning the Bible, and all the calamitous 
efforts of its friends to perpetuate them, its influence 
on the whole has been so markedly for good, not 
only at the period described by Mr.. Green, but dur- 
ing succeeding generations and throughout the 
world. To substantiate so favourable a verdict the 
witness of its eager devotees is not required. The 
most impartial critics will suffice for appeal. The 
testimonies of Ruskin, Huxley, Carlyle, Matthew 
Arnold, Heine, and a host of others, have been so 
often quoted that it would be misused space to re- 
peat them here. They are in themselves more than 
sufficient answer to the popular gibes which a 
cheapened press is ever seeking to disseminate. Of 
such efforts Huxley's estimate quoted above, is as 
well warranted as it is outspoken. 

(iii) But when the truth of a progressive revela- 
tion — "the gradual evolution of the idea of God 
amongst the Jews from a lower to a higher concep- 
tion " 1 — is acknowledged and appreciated, M rational- 
ist " attacks lose their last appearance of reason. 
Indeed the Bible then becomes, as a manifestly faith- 
ful record, all the more valuable because of the very 
things in it which its hostile critics have so often 
singled out for denunciation. It is no longer taken 
to be a homogeneous volume, equal in all its parts 
and equally applicable to all times and nations, but 
the history of a process of revelation varying as 
much on a larger scale, and as necessarily, as the 
education of a child varies, and containing inevitably 
some elements which must in later times be laid 
aside, whilst others may remain. 

If this principle is clearly understood and un- 
hesitatingly applied, there need be no fear of the 

1 " God and My Neighbour," by R. Blatchford, p. 73. 



156 HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY? 

Bible's becoming an obsolete book, a mere religious 
curiosity for the museum or library. Rather is it 
true as Dr. Garvie has recently said : — 

" Not only is the older view of the Bible intel- 
lectually impossible for the modern mind, but 
even if it could be held it would not offer what 
faith to-day needs. Not a creed, or a code, or 
a ritual, even though all alleged to be divinely 
dictated, can relieve the soul's distress ; but a 
history that discloses God's guiding hand and 
advancing purpose ; a personality so sure of 
God that his faith does not fail in the darkness 
and desolation of life and death, and an experi- 
ence of a present salvation from sin, weakness 
and the fear of death. These alone inspire cer- 
tainty and victory." 

(iv) When the Bible is thus fairly treated ; when 
the mistakes of preceding theologians are corrected ; 
in a word when the Old Testament is viewed always 
and only in the light of the New ; its brighter parts 
become all the more wonderful and precious, whilst 
the darker are left out of concern as calling no more 
for our judgement than our imitation. On this sub- 
ject Mr. V. F. Storr has well said that — 

" Christians from the earliest times have of 
course believed that the Old Testament revela- 
tion was preparatory for that in the New, but 
it has been given to this age to bring out more 
plainly the relation between the two, and to 
view the whole movement from beginning to 
end as the gradual unfolding of a magnificent 
Divine plan. In the light of this conception of 
development, the revelation recorded in the 
Bible glows with fresh significance." 1 

1 "The Inspiration of the Bible," p. 21. 



HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY ? 157 

It can never be said too plainly that to the modern 
Christian mind the Old Testament is always neither 
more nor less than Jesus makes it, in all that relates 
alike to God and man. 

His revelation is the true and final guide, both to 
our own Christian conception of God and to our esti- 
mate of all the representations of God which are 
found in the Jewish Scriptures. Where these latter 
clash with the former, they must be dismissed as 
archaisms, without hesitation. 1 They are but human 
mistakes, natural then, inexcusable now. Whether it 
be the slaughter of the Canaanites, the political mass- 
acres of kings, or any other occasion in which " Thus 
saith the Lord " occurs, the only question for the 
Christian is, does this reference to God harmon- 
ize with Christ's revelation of the Divine Father- 
hood ? If it does not, then it is but a pitiful human 
error. " It cannot be that God has changed His 
moral character. He cannot have approved of deceit 
and cruelty in Old Testament times, while condemn- 
ing them in New Testament times. God changes 
not. It is men's thoughts about God which change." 2 
Such errors were pardonable under their circum- 
stances, for they knew no better. For us they would 
be unpardonable, seeing that we have learned of 
Jesus Christ. 

1 " In much that I used to suppose I must receive as true of God, 
I now read the record and effect of what people thought of God — a 
difference that goes to the very bottom of the matter " (Dr. W. N. 
Clarke, " Sixty Years, etc.," p. 232). So too Mr. V. F. Storr (" The 
Inspiration of the Bible," p. 21) : "When the Bible records a com- 
mand from God to massacre the Canaanites, we cannot believe that 
God actually gave such a command. We say that the men of that 
time were misled. They attributed to God a command which was 
really due to their own imperfect notion of God. The theory of 
plenary inspiration cannot satisfactorily deal with these moral diffi- 
culties of the Old Testament. The theory of a progressive revelation, 
and of an inspiration so interpreted, can deal with them." 

2 V. F. Storr, "The Inspiration of the Bible," p, 21. 



1 58 HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY ? 

So too in regard to the characters of men. It is 
well to face frankly what in this regard militates 
against the appreciation of the Bible by the modern 
mind. Take one popular specimen. After a chapter 
of rancorous and one-sided exaggeration — for even 
Jacob, and Joseph, and Moses, and Samson, and 
David, had their good points — a well-known anti- 
Christian journalist writes thus : — 

11 Now it is not necessary for me to harp upon 
the conduct of these men of God ; what I want 
to point out is that these cruel and ignorant 
savages have been saddled upon the Christian 
religion as heroes and as models. I only wish 
to show that these favourites of God were not 
admirable characters, and that therefore the 
Bible cannot be a Divine revelation. As for 
animus, I do not believe any of these men ever 
existed." x 

It were easy to show how uncritical as well as 
illogical, are all such representations. But they 
catch the popular eye and are often effective. For 
which reason their falsity needs exposure. If men 
were not blinded by prejudice they could not but 
see that Christ's words dismiss for ever the notion 
that these, or any other Old Testament heroes, are 
"models" for Christian believers. Jesus never 
allowed any other than Himself as a model for His 
disciples. " I have given you an example that you 
should do as I have done to you " — was His all- 
comprehensive word. To that ideal all that the 
i\postles ever said, or did, or wrote, always referred. 
To assert that the Bible cannot be a Divine revela- 
tion because it contains an honest history of imper- 
fect men, is so transparently absurd as to need really 
no refutation. Yet it must be confessed that many 

1 " God and My Neighbour," pp. 64, 65. 



HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY ? 159 

Christian teachers, in pulpits and schools and books, 
have laid Christianity open to such criticism, in 
making far too much of some of these Old Testament 
characters, and have drawn lessons of imitation 
which should certainly have been lessons of contrast. 
This, however, is but a human mistake which, with 
many others, is being slowly but surely corrected, 
as the minds of believers are freed from false theories 
of inspiration and encouraged to look with open eyes 
upon the facts recorded, so as to estimate them 
from the standard of Jesus Christ. Once again Dr. 
W. N. Clarke's deliberate judgement, after his sixty 
years' study, deserves to be repeated : — 

11 1 now see clearly and gratefully how broad 
is the contrast between the Christian thought 
of God and much that stands in the Old Testa- 
ment; how broad is the contrast too between 
the best in the Old Testament and much that 
stands beside it there. This contrast it is my 
duty to note and my privilege to keep in memory. 
In dealing with the Bible I am as free to call 
black black as I am to call white white ; and I 
am delivered from the too familiar temptation to 
call black white for the glory of God. Thus, 
difficulty with the Bible on account of these 
moral contrasts is entirely gone, and can never 
return to trouble me." 1 

On the whole, therefore, it may be truthfully 
affirmed that when the Bible is relieved of the 
burdens which its past and present friends put upon 
it, and viewed as it ought to be in the light of the 
new and better Covenant which comes to humanity 
in the person and work of Jesus Christ, it will neither 
need apology nor be in any danger of contempt. 
Instead of being ignored, it will become at once more 

1 p- 233- 



160 HOW DOES THE BIBLE STAND TO-DAY? 

interesting and influential than ever before. In the 
degree in which it becomes in the new light " under- 
standed of the people," instead of being a kind of 
religious fetish, it will be read afresh with attention 
which will require no forcing, and will meet with 
growing practical appreciation. Furthermore, in 
full view of all the knowledge of the Scriptures of 
other religions which have only recently become the 
possession of modern students, it may be said with- 
out hesitation, that there is no collection of sacred 
writings on earth which so merits earnest scrutiny 
and devout acceptance, as this wonderful religious 
literature which we call the Bible. Like Christianity 
itself, it is emerging from the clouds in which sincere 
but mistaken piety has all too long enveloped it, 
with every promise of that clearer light and greater 
warmth which this century needs. Its true ap- 
preciation, like the rising of the sun on a foggy 
morning, will avail to rid us of mediaeval ignorance 
and ecclesiastical bigotry, no less than of the 
naturalistic conceit and materialistic scorn for life's 
real value which threaten with their blight our 
modern world. " If we are willing " — rightly says an 
expert modern teacher — "to pay the price, we shall 
discover in the Bible, - and in the life in God of 
which the Bible is witness, the pearl of great price 
which with abounding joy we can claim as our 
own." Then the ancient seer's words, in the light 
of the teaching of Jesus, become incandescent with 
a significance beyond his farthest and highest vision : 
" The law of Thy mouth is better unto me than 
thousands of gold and silver ". 



ARE THE CHURCHES HELPING THE 
MODERN APPRECIATION OF THE BIBLE? 



ii 



" Whoever was the first dogmatist to make the terms " the Bible " and 
"the word of God " synonymous, rendered to the cause of truth and re- 
ligion an immense disservice. The phrase in that sense has no shadow of 
scriptural authority. It occurs from three to four hundred times in the Old 
Testament and about a hundred times in the New ; and in not one of 
all those instances is it applied to the Scriptures. The formula of the 
Reformation in its best days, like that of the Church of England, was not 
' Scripture is the word of God ' but ' Scripture contains the word of 
God '." — Dean Farrar, " History of Interpretation ". 

" Criticism is not a hostile force hovering round the march of the 
Christian Church, picking off all loosely attached followers and galling the 
main body ; it is rather the highly trained corps of scouts and skirmishers 
thrown out on all sides to ascertain in what direction it is safe and possible 
for the Church to advance." 

— Dr. Marcus Dods, " The Bible : its'jDrigin and Nature ". 

"It is strange and lamentable that people who profess to regard the 
Bible as God's own word should be so little anxious to find out what God 
did say that they persistently cling to an antiquated translation although 
a better one has been available for a generation. It is specially to be re- 
gretted that the tercentenary of the so-called ' Authorized ' Version has 
been used to give a new lease of life to a version which constituted an 
immense advance in 1611, but is unmistakably inferior to the one issued in 
1881-1886. The year 1929 will see the centenary of Stephenson's Rocket ; 
but no one will propose to celebrate the occasion by attaching exact 
replicas of that famous engine to our express trains — the tendency will be 
rather to emphasise the progress made in the intervening century." 

—Dr. J. Warschauer, " What is the Bible ? " 

" The Churches have hardly faced this problem of the Bible in modern 
light, even yet ; nevertheless the time is at hand when it will have to be 
faced with candour and thoroughness, for the capacity of the human mind 
for harbouring contradictory notions side by side without suspecting the 
contradiction, is after all, not unlimited. Increasing numbers year by 
year grow aware of the discrepancy between some pronouncements of Scrip- 
ture and the teachings they receive in the fields of secular knowledge ; 
with results that are often deplorable and even tragic. The Churches and 
the Sunday schools will have to take up a far more courageous position 
in regard to this matter than they have done so far. It is the product of 
antiquated teaching, such as is still given in so many Sunday schools, who 
becomes the ready victim of the ' Rationalist' propaganda." 

—Dr. J. Warschauer, " What is the Bible? " 



1 63 



CHAPTER VI 

ARE THE CHURCHES HELPING THE 
MODERN APPRECIATION OF THE BIBLE ? 

To such an inquiry only a very hesitating answer 
can honestly be given. If the Unitarian and some 
few Congregational Churches be excepted, the follow- 
ing estimate, which forms the opening page of a 
valuable little book by a well-known Congregational 
minister, is only too true of the bulk of the Evangeli- 
cal Churches throughout these realms : — 

" The Bible needs neither our apology nor 
our eulogy ; it only needs to be understood. 
And it is not understood. Despite the publica- 
tion of excellent expositions of the conclusions 
of competent scholars, despite the fact that in 
the centres of sound learning these conclusions 
form the basis of instruction, the ignorance of 
the Christian public is almost undisturbed, and 
the majority of professional teachers of the 
Bible speak as if nothing had happened to inter- 
fere with the traditional assumption that all our 
Scriptures are equally inspired, authoritative, 
and infallible." 1 

The recent tercentenary year of the English 
version of 1611, has afforded a splendid opportunity 
for the worthy and impressive recommendation of 
the Bible to the modern mind, but it is to be feared 
that little will come of it in the direction most needed. 

1 " The Value of the Old Testament," by Bernard J. Snell (Jas. 
Clarke & Co.). 



1 64 ARE THE CHURCHES HELPING 

Nothing is easier than to multiply eulogies in print, 
and make mass meetings ring with popular ap- 
plause ; but the permanent utility of such efforts is 
very small for the present generation. What is 
really wanted is a plain and reliable statement of 
the main principles upon which alone the Bible can 
be urged upon the attention of the modern world, 
together with the unanimous adoption of those prin- 
ciples in the regular teaching of the Churches. With- 
out both of these, the Bible will count for less and 
less in the life of the age, and will at the most remain 
the religious manual of the minority rather than the 
revered treasure of the majority. How far it is, even 
now, from being to all Englishmen what the Koran is 
to all Mussulmans, is manifest enough. Whilst there 
are many and various reasons for this difference, 
one of the greatest, if not actually the greatest, is to 
be found in the well-meant but utterly useless per- 
sistence on the part of vast numbers of Christians — 
teachers and people alike — to maintain what they 
call " Our grand old Book " on the unchanged lines 
of the last three centuries. The general tone in 
which the Bible is continually referred to in many 
religious periodicals, for instance, is such an exhibi- 
tion of determined ignoring of all modern increase 
of knowledge and clearer apprehension of principles, 
as to make one almost despair for the future ; whilst 
any attempt to suggest a wiser and truer course, will 
certainly be met only with denunciations. Dr. Selleck 
is but too well warranted in his attitude of con- 
cern : — 

" I believe then that the gravest danger to be 
feared from Biblical criticism to-day is, not that 
the acceptance of its teachings will undermine 
the faith of devout souls, but that the rejection 
of its well-established results, together with an 



THE APPRECIATION OF THE BIBLE? 165 

attitude of unfriendliness towards all its work, 
will do the Christian Church incalculable harm, 
through the alienation of vast numbers of 
thoughtful inquiring people." 

That what this writer deprecates is taking place 
to a serious extent, any impartial observer cannot 
but see. Yet is it naturally a mental process which 
takes place so quietly, and is so little likely to be 
mentioned, that there can be no doubt as to the 
reality of the effect being greater than the appear- 
ance. What is to be the general result, rests between 
Christian teachers and the people to whom they 
minister. The main features of the present situation 
seem to be as follows : — 

1. It cannot be too plainly said that every oc- 
cupant of a Christian pulpit in these days, ought to 
know something more about the Bible than the 
traditions in which he has been brought up. There 
is no other realm of life in which the knowledge and 
practice of a century ago would suffice. There is no 
shadow of reason why in the highest realm of all, 
ignorance and obscurantism should prevail. A 
recent Bampton Lecturer, far removed from rash 
statement and uncharity, but as examining chaplain 
to a bishop having special opportunities for know- 
ledge, has spoken seriously hereupon : — 

11 Perhaps the greatest cause which makes us 
unprofitable servants to-day is ignorance. The 
English clergy was once called the wonder of 
the world for its learning ; but compared with 
the lay folk it is a learned clergy no longer. 
But there are two things every clergyman must 
know if he is to be a minister of Christ — his 
Bible and his people. As a Church we must 
use intelligent criticism and sincere exegesis, 
if we are to understand what is the word of God 



1 66 ARE THE CHURCHES HELPING 

and be listened to by educated people. As in- 
dividuals we need perhaps more that deep and 
exact knowledge of the sacred text which I 
think is very rare among candidates for Orders, 
but is worth more than all other learning for 
purposes of teaching and devotion. There is so 
much to read, so much to learn nowadays, that 
it is hard to get such a knowledge of the Bible. 
Yet we must get it." J 

Judging, as one must, from the way in which the 
Bible is read and expounded in public by the average 
preacher, the people are not likely to be greatly in- 
structed. The perfunctory reading of the " lessons " 
from the Old Version without note or comment — 
often with an unnatural ecclesiastical monotone — 
becomes in unnumbered cases nothing more than a 
meaningless custom, to which not one in a hundred 
of the audience pays any genuine or intelligent heed. 
But bad reading and false exegesis have their roots 
in poor understanding. And the lack of real under- 
standing is due to unwillingness to spend the time and 
pains which are confessedly necessary, if the modern 
Christian teacher is to fulfil his duty. It is so 
lamentably easy to ignore all that is difficult, and 
then take refuge in the equally hackneyed and untrue 
insinuation that the critics are so divided amongst 
themselves that no good can come from noticing 
them. Yet take only such a mild statement as this 
from a thoroughly orthodox source : — 

" Historical criticism has proved with over- 
whelming force that some of the older views as 
to the way in which the sacred books were 
written, were altogether defective. It has taken 
away the picture of the nation of Israel starting 
on its career endowed by Moses with a com- 

1 " Bampton Lectures," 1907, by J. H. F. Peile. 



THE APPRECIATION OF THE BIBLE? 167 

pletely developed system of laws adequate for 
all the needs of the future. Instead of that, it 
has shown that like the laws of other peoples 
the laws of Israel grew with the life of the 
nation and were supplied to meet each successive 
demand as it arose. Corresponding to the 
three main codes of law which it discovers in 
the Pentateuch, it is able to point to the three 
periods of history during which these codes 
were active. 

" In their broad outlines the results of modern 
criticism have secured the allegiance of nearly 
all the scholars of all the Protestant Churches 
and seem to be impregnable. The task of the 
future will be much more to interpret than dis- 
prove these results." 1 

Such a cautious and gentle estimate may well be 
taken as the very minimum of educated apprecia- 
tion of the Bible to-day, upon which all the Churches 
should be truly and heartily in agreement. Yet 
apart from the usually hesitant attitude of most 
evangelical occupants of pulpits, and of course re- 
vival and Mission preachers, we find another minister 
of the very same Church as the lecturer just quoted, 
who does not shrink from printing and teaching 
as reckless a general misrepresentation as this — 

"The people are not told how often the 
higher criticism has proved to be the higher 
conceit, and the higher ignorance; how often 
its declarations have been falsified by subse- 
quent investigations and explorations; how 
completely its criticism is at its best hypothetical 
and based upon assumptions instead of upon the 
documentary evidence of manuscripts; how 

1 " Fernley Lecture for 1910," by W. J. Moulton, M.A., Tutor, 
Headingley College, Leeds, pp. xi-xviii. 



168 ARE THE CHURCHES HELPING 

easily a lot of its theories about the Elohistic 
and Jehovistic parts of Genesis can be explained ; 
nor how often and utterly these so-called critics 
disagree among themselves." 1 

Nor is there any question that such sentiments still 
pass for special piety amongst vast numbers in the 
Churches. In by no means few cases, this attitude 
goes so far as not merely to ignore the Revised 
Version, but to prohibit its reading in public. 

2. Thus it comes to pass that there is yet need 
for no little courage on the part of such teachers as 
know and appreciate the truth in modern light, when 
they desire to impart it to their congregations. Dr. 
Forsyth has well said that — 

"There is no more difficult position to-day, 
nor one which evokes less sympathy, than that 
of the minister who has to stand between the 
world of modern knowledge on the one hand, 
and the world of traditional religion on the 
other, and mediate between them." 

But it is also true, as the same competent authority 
goes on to say, that — 

"The question of belief is becoming a much 
more serious question for the Free Churches 
than the question of their public work or social 
sympathies. What the Church seems to require 
most at the moment, is less an army of scholars 
engaged upon research work upon origins, than 
a growing body of men at once disciplined to 
scientific sympathies by a proper education in 
its schools, secured there also in a theology of 
experimental faith, and at the same time pro- 
vided with the art of public teaching and en- 

1 " The Churches and the Present Outlook," by Rev. T. Waugh, 
P- 35- 



THE APPRECIATION OF THE BIBLE? 169 

dowed with the sympathy and tact which win 
the trust of the evangelical public." 1 

So long as the Churches are supplied with certain 
kinds of religious literature under the guise of 
special devotion, it will be immeasurably difficult for 
an honest and instructed Christian teacher to tell the 
truth that so much needs to be known about the 
Bible. Thus the work referred to in the previous 
section, published by a highly respected firm in 
London, and obtaining a large circulation, makes the 
following statements for the benefit of devout 
Christians : — 

" It can now be asserted upon the authority 
of the most eminent men of science that not a 
single fact stands in contradiction to the creation 
story of Genesis. . . . The important fact which 
Mr. Spencer and his disciples failed to note is 
that the operation of the law of evolution is 
rigidly limited to the circle of the activities of 
the descendants of Adam. Within that circle 
everything, without exception, is subject to 
evolutionary changes. Outside of it there is 
not a trace of such changes. In a word, the 
area of the operation of the law of evolution 
coincides absolutely with the area of the con- 
sequence of man's departure from the will of 
God as described in Genesis in. Evolution is 
but the law of the career of fallen man. . . . Man 
then for the first time set himself to do what he 
has been prone to do ever since, namely to 
question and pass judgment upon the expediency 
of a Divine commandment. He became, in a 
word, a higher critic, that is to say, a man who 
assumes to criticize the word of God." 2 

1 " The Inspiration and Authority of Holy Scripture," by J. M. 
Gibson, pp. x, xi, xvii. 

2 "The World and its God," by Philip Mauro, pp. 15, 21, 33. 



170 ARE THE CHURCHES HELPING 

This is a specimen of much more of the kind which 
is not only repeated in other books and booklets, 
but endorsed as the real truth by thousands of Chris- 
tians who are as sincere as they are ill-informed. 
They are apparently altogether blind to the fact that 
they are giving modern Bible haters exactly the op- 
portunity which is desired, for bringing the Bible into 
contempt. They are also equally unaware that their 
own attitude constitutes as real criticism as that 
which they ignorantly condemn. The sole but 
significant difference is that they refuse to face the 
facts which those whom they denounce set before 
them. 

Happily, however, light is breaking in spite of all 
the well-intended efforts to prevent it. Slowly but 
surely, intelligent honesty is becoming recognized as 
the essential element in all genuine piety. But it 
is even yet a sure way to popularity in the Evan- 
gelical Churches, to declaim about " clinging to the 
old Book," and believing in the Bible " from back 
to back ". It is no less certain that the most care- 
ful, sincere, and thoughtful endeavour to lead an 
ordinary congregation to something truer, deeper, 
and better than ancient tradition or venerable 
custom, will be, by a majority, received with thank- 
less coldness, if not bitterly opposed as dangerous 
heresy. Under these circumstances the Christian 
teacher of to-day will do well to call to mind the 
attitude adopted by Peter and John when similarly 
obliged to contravene established religious usages 
— ■" Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken 
unto you rather than unto God, judge ye ". There 
is good reason to believe that the number is increas- 
ing of those who without any trace of scorn for the 
old, are none the less firmly devoted to the true, and 
therefore appreciative of the new, as one such 
says : — 



THE APPRECIATION OF THE BIBLE? 171 

" Let the truth be told. There is nothing to 
hide. Pious evasion of the truth has landed us 
in the deplorable position, which is being widely 
recognized, that the tendency of men is away 
from our Churches because they think that there 
counsel has been darkened, and because they 
affirm that there they are not sure of hearing the 
honest truth honestly uttered." 1 

3. As to how much of the new understanding of 
the Bible may be or should be introduced into ordin- 
ary Christian pulpits or public services, no definite 
rule can be wisely laid down, so much depends upon 
the man and the environment. But we have the 
very highest injunction to be "wise as serpents" 
and to " prove all things ". Certainly nothing can 
excuse entire ignoring of modern knowledge, or 
faithless fear in acknowledging what is now shown 
to be true. A coward has no place in the Christian 
ministry. Even if it be not the preacher's wise 

1 " The Value of the Old Testament," by B. J. Snell, p. 16. To 
this may be added the words of a well-known conservative scholar 
of the Anglican Church which worthily summarize the whole situa- 
tion. In his valuable little booklet entitled " Some Thoughts on 
Inspiration," Dr. J. A. R. Robinson says : " We answer, then, in 
the spirit of humility and reverence, that instead of using the Gospels 
to foreclose inquiry, we must use the results of inquiry to interpret 
the Gospels. Once again, therefore, in the name of truth, we hold 
open the door. Let inquiry proceed ; the light shall help us, as we 
reverently welcome and use it. We shall not accept every new hypo- 
thesis as bringing the light of truth. We shall test the hypotheses 
with a rigorous scrutiny ; or if we cannot test them ourselves, we 
shall wait until others whom we can trust have tested them. We 
shall accept for our guidance the considered verdict of the ablest and 
most devout of the scholars of the Christian Church. We shall ask 
them to be honest, fearless, and grave, well weighing their responsi- 
bility to guide those who cannot undertake the inquiry for themselves." 
It is difficult to speak too highly of the little work (sixpence, Long- 
mans) from which these words are taken. Compared with some 
other issues on this theme, it is as refreshing as a breath of pure air 
after the hot stuffiness of a crowded assembly. 



172 ARE THE CHURCHES HELPING 

course, as a rule, to deal with this whole matter 
directly and categorically from the pulpit, it is always 
both possible and his solemn duty to impart what 
is true, as against what is untrue, in his references 
to Scripture narratives, biographies, didactic prin- 
ciples, and special passages. The very least that 
can be expected from him is — so far as he can get 
to know it — the truth, the whole truth, and nothing 
but the truth. 

Any summary, at once adequate and brief, of what 
this involves in regard to the Bible in modern light, 
is of course impossible here. By way of suggestion, 
however, the following may be mentioned as con- 
stituting a minimum of what may be expected from 
"every scribe well trained for the Kingdom of 
Heaven " 1 in these days. 

Assuming that at the present time the English 
Bible is in all his hearers' hands, he must not 
shrink from pointing out that the appreciation of 
the version generally but inaccurately called the 
11 Authorized" Version, may be overdone. No one 
questions its excellence, and indeed, for the time 
when it was made, its wonderfulness. But when 
all the changes have been rung upon the accustomed 
phrases, as to its being a " well of English undefiled," 
"a marvel of classical English," "an embodiment of 
perfect rhythm," etc., etc., it has to be recognized 
that this revision was no more flawless than the 
fifteen, or more, others which preceded it. The 
errors and failings in it were neither few nor trifling. 
In many cases most serious and fundamental matters 
of Christian doctrine are involved ; whilst in number- 
less other instances its archaisms, as compared with 
the speech of to-day, are most misleading. The Re- 
vised Version is not perfect, any more than its prede- 

1 Matt. xiii. 52, Weymouth. 



THE APPRECIATION OF THE BIBLE? 173 

cessor ; but it is so marked an improvement, in the 
accuracy of crucial passages and the general fidelity 
with which the original is represented to the modern 
average reader, that it and it alone, for the present, 
ought to be used in all religious services and Sunday 
schools throughout the country. In America the 
Standard Edition may well be preferred. But in 
this country it will for some time be best to keep to 
the Revised for public use, whilst recommending all 
ordinary English readers who desire the truth, to 
supplement it by Dr. Weymouth's "New Testa- 
ment in Modern Speech," or the "Twentieth Cen- 
tury New Testament," so as to get as near as possible 
to what Evangelists and Apostles actually wrote. 

There ought also to be no hesitation in affirming 
that the Bible should be approached as any other 
book, with an open mind, and not with predeter- 
mination to find in it all the conventions of orthodoxy. 
Its composite character should always be recognized, 
and the notion of treating all its many and varied 
parts as of equal value and authority, should be dis- 
tinctly set aside. The importance of taking into 
account always the special circumstances connected 
with each writing can scarcely be exaggerated, and 
to this end it is certainly part of the teacher's duty 
to acquaint both himself and his people with the best 
modern helps from the hands of competent scholars. 
Happily there need be no difficulty about this, thanks 
to the ever-cheapening press. 1 In any and every 
case, whether it be called " criticism " or anything 
else, honest inquiry must be welcomed. If there 
should happen some such shock as came to good 
Bishop Colenso when the Zulu put the question 
to him — "Bishop, what about Exodus xxi. 20?" — 
it will be gain, in any instance, to lose a wrong 

1 At the close of this section a brief list of specially useful works 
in this regard will be found. 



174 ARE THE CHURCHES HELPING 

conception. The words found in the first issue of the 
" Minutes of the Wesleyan Conference " express 
the only genuine Christian attitude — 

"What are we afraid of? Of overturning 
our first principles ? If they are false, the sooner 
they are overturned the better. If they are 
true, they will bear the strictest investigation." 

The great emerging certainty will be that neither 
any one Christian doctrine, nor any true understand- 
ing and appreciation of the Bible itself, can be derived 
from a few picked passages which in their unwar- 
ranted isolation from their context have been called 
" proof texts " There is always and only one royal 
road, viz. the careful, thorough, patient, study of the 
whole connexion in every case, together with intelli- 
gent comparison of the results so obtained. 

Doubtless this will seem a "large order," alike to 
many in the pulpit and the pew. But it ought not 
to be to any a mere counsel of despair. It embodies 
only the same principles as are applied to every 
other serious business or study in these days. There 
is no reason whatever why the modern teacher of re- 
ligion should be permitted to go on contenting himself 
with such methods, superficial, half-instructed, out- 
of-date, as would not be tolerated in any other pro- 
fession. It has been well and truly said that " If it 
is heresy to think ahead of one's time, is it not heresy 
to think behind one's time ? " 1 

4. It cannot be denied nor can one be surprised, 

1 " Sixty Years with the Bible," Dr. W. N. Clarke, p. 182— where 
the author adds, " Thus the case opened to me when the claims of 
the higher criticism were first presented. I have never seen it in 
any other light, and for many years I have not talked as if Moses 
wrote the Pentateuch, or the book of Isaiah had but one author, or 
Job and Jonah were historical. On these points and various others 
I am sure ; naturally there are some on which I am waiting for 
certainty, and hold only provisional conclusions." 



THE APPRECIATION OF THE BIBLE? 175 

that in view of all the facts, and of what is said about 
them by some enemies of the Bible and not a few of 
its avowed friends, there should be found amongst 
vast numbers of ordinary believers, a genuine fear, 
sometimes not far from panic, that the modern view 
of the Bible is going to rob them of the comfort and 
inspiration and hope which they have undoubtedly 
found in it on the old lines of belief. It would be 
as vain as dishonest to pretend that there is no such 
loss. It is in some respects as real as inevitable. 
It were easy enough to reply that it is no loss to lose 
a shilling and find a sovereign. If, indeed, such 
finding followed immediately upon the losing, there 
would be no room for tears. But in the present 
case it is not always so. Moreover, whilst the old 
appreciation of the Bible came as an easy inheritance, 
the new has to be earned ; and before that is accom- 
plished there is undoubtedly some real room for 
lamentation. When the old is going or gone, and 
the new has not yet been discerned, it is no wonder 
that the sense of loss seems sometimes overwhelm- 
ing. The old simplicity and directness which took 
every comforting sentence that was found anywhere, 
just as it stood, as the veritable "word of God"; 
the former unquestioning sense of absolute reliability, 
to the last detail, which was perfectly content to re- 
gard every statement as beyond doubt so long as it 
was in the Bible ; the long-established feeling of 
reverence which applied "Thus saith the Lord "to 
every command and every ideal without regard to 
context ; the comforting sense of sufficiency which 
permitted hosts of sincere believers tp be literally 
men of one book; the hitherto accepted sharp-cut 
definition of inspiration, which seemed to make 
everything so clear and so sure for evermore ; above 
all, the unreasoning but most potent sense of old 
association ■ which so charged familiar words with 



176 ARE THE CHURCHES HELPING 

tender memories, making the charm of Elizabethan 
English to be almost heavenly music through the 
recollections of childhood, and still more sacred as 
having lingered on the lips of loved ones lost ; the 
thought of losing or even lessening all this, may well, 
to unsophisticated souls, seem overwhelming. The 
whole situation is, undoubtedly, one which will re- 
quire the utmost wisdom and tenderness for many 
a year to come. 

But the words of Christ Himself, as reported in 
the fourth Gospel, unmistakably summarize His 
whole message — " Ye shall know the truth, and the 
truth shall make you free ". Nothing more, nothing 
less, than " whatsoever things are true" — as Paul 
loyally put it, will avail as the basis of the Kingdom 
of Heaven. ' ' Whatsoever things were written afore- 
time were written for our learning, that we, through 
patience, and comfort of the Scriptures, might have 
hope." That satisfies all the need for definition and 
yields a sufficient principle of guidance. When, in- 
deed, it is pointed out that the Bible is not an inspired 
book, but a collection of the writings and utterances 
of men who were inspired in greatly varying degrees, 
and that such inspiration itself admits of no exact 
definition, many believers become impatient and de- 
claim vehemently against such impious " hair split- 
ting ". But such an estimate is true, all the same. 
And that is the main matter, by the side of which 
all else is trifling. Any faith which requires untruth 
in its foundations, is doomed to perish. 

5. Happily, it is not difficult to show in regard to 
the Bible, wherever patience obtains, that the gain 
from steadily pursuing the truth, at all cost, is im- 
measurably greater than the loss. It is doubly so, 
being both negative and positive ; and no religious 
lesson whatever is of greater import in these days. 

The negative gain consists in relief from an incubus 



THE APPRECIATION OF THE BIBLE? 177 

of difficulty which had become simply intolerable. 
How great was the need for such relief, every teacher 
of a senior Bible class knows well, to say nothing of 
the everywhere-felt though not always expressed 
mental troubles of intelligent Christian Church 
members. Dr. J. A. Robinson has truly summarized 
the situation in the little booklet above mentioned : — 

" This lower conception of the work of the 
inspiring Spirit, this supposition of a dictated 
book every statement of which must needs be 
historically and scientifically accurate, has gradu- 
ally fastened itself on the minds of Englishmen 
since the middle of the seventeenth century, 
notwithstanding the silent protest of the Church 
of England and the open protest of such spiritual 
reformers as the early Quakers. It is this con- 
ception which, as knowledge has increased, has 
produced so grave a perplexity that many men 
have closed the Old Testament altogether, and 
to vast multitudes, unless some help is offered 
them, it will presently become a sealed book." 1 

The matters which tend thus to seal the Old Testa- 
ment, are so familiar as scarcely to need statement. 
The view of the first eleven chapters of Genesis as 
literal and exact history ; the persistent representa- 
tion of the first chapter as in perfect harmony with 
modern science ; the often-occurring revolting ac- 
companiments of the phrase "Thus saith the Lord " ; 
the frightful things directly attributed to God which 
give such a lurid opportunity for opponents to revile 
His character ; the standard of morals which satis- 
fied the ancient Jews but repels and disgusts both 
Jews and Christians to-day ; the simple narration of 
most stupendous occurrences such as the speaking 
ass of Balaam, the floating iron, the standing still of 

1 " Some Thoughts on Inspiration," p. 39. 
12 



178 ARE THE CHURCHES HELPING 

the sun and moon at Joshua's prayer, the slaughter of 
forty-two children for mocking Elisha, etc., etc. ; the 
representation of the drama of Job and the parable 
of Jonah as necessarily exact history ; all these, with 
many other things arising out of the current theory 
of inspiration, had become such real and great 
stumbling-blocks to Christian faith, that either they 
or it must certainly be given up. They were alike 
inevitable and intolerable. But they are so no 
longer. Whether the new and better understanding 
of the Bible be called the " Higher Criticism," or 
aught else, matters nothing. It is the truth which sets 
us free from error ; and no loss on earth is so great 
gain as the loss of error. For the full statement of 
this, reference must be made to other excellent works 
which are now so accessible that it is any man's 
own fault, be he believer or unbeliever, if he does 
not see the truth and know it to be such. 1 From 
the veteran teacher already more than once referred 
to, the following extract also merits special regard ; 
though the whole book whence these words were 
taken ought rather to be studied by any and every 
one who is obsessed with the notion that modern 
knowledge, honestly applied to the Bible, means the 
loss of its spiritual influence or the destruction of 
Christian faith. 

" Thus by all my studies I was pledged to 
this new form of study which they called the 
Higher Criticism. How it has been misunder- 
stood ! Well I remember the solemnity with 

1 Mr. Storr in his little booklet above mentioned, has specially 
summarized much in little — " How is it that Jael was praised for 
treachery ; or that the Israelites were commanded by God to mass- 
acre hosts of innocent and defenceless Canaanites ? It cannot be 
that God has changed His moral character. It is men's thoughts 
about God which change " (" The Inspiration of the Bible," p. 21). 



THE APPRECIATION OF THE BIBLE? 179 

which a minister said in my hearing ' The 
higher criticism is not higher, morally '. 

" No one ever said that it was. But it is 
legitimate morally, and necessary to the under- 
standing of the Bible. Late in the 'eighties I 
read the statement that the Higher Criticism 
had already relieved us of more than half of the 
moral difficulties of the Old Testament. I 
thought it true and have never doubted it. 
Indeed, more is true. The Higher Criticism re- 
moves the cause of the deepest of those diffi- 
culties, for it shows us that Christians need not 
attribute to the God of Christ all the acts and 
passions that Israelites attributed to the God 
of Israel, or approve the moral judgments that 
were recorded in days of inferior light. 

" I commend this experience of mine to the 
many Christians who have been led to suppose 
that the higher criticism can be nothing else 
than a weapon of unbelief. For me it has 
made the Bible to be far more consistently 
a Christian book than it had ever been before, 
and has placed it in my hands more ready for 
all Christians' use. In my progress towards 
the restful attitude concerning the Bible which 
I now hold, I thankfully recognize the Higher 
Criticism as one of the most valuable of helps." l 

Should it be said, as it well may be, this is all 
very well in regard to the Old Testament, but what 
will become of the New Testament upon the same 
principles, there need be no hesitancy in reply. 
The gain through loss will be just as real ; the nega- 

lu Sixty Years with the Bible," pp. 179, 183, 184, 188, 192. 
The somewhat frequent and lengthy references to this work are given 
on purpose to direct special attention to it, as being one of the most 
valuable and timely issues from the modern religious press. 



180 ARE THE CHURCHES HELPING 

tive relief is both as necessary and as timely. Re- 
lief from the compulsory acceptance of every miracle 
just as related ; from the persistent application 
of isolated proof-texts as the sufficient foundation of 
Christian doctrine ; from a total Paulinism in all those 
details which were inseparable from the Apostle's 
training and times ; from the costly delusions as to 
the cataclysmic ushering in of the Millennium, which 
not only possessed the early Christians but have pro- 
fitlessly troubled vast numbers of modern disciples, 
through calculations from cryptic figures in the 
enigmatic books of Daniel and Revelation. From 
these, and other cognate errors, modern Christianity 
must be relieved if it is to endure, let alone to 
develop. 

In regard to the whole Bible, it is scarcely too 
much to say, that when it is thus viewed in the sober 
light of our latest knowledge, there are no Biblical 
difficulties left. It is lamentable indeed to think how 
tragically those who sincerely maintain the old 
conceptions of plenary inspiration, play into the hands 
of all such writers as are represented by the flood 
of sixpenny reprints issued from the " Rationalist 
Press Association ". 1 It is high time that this 
utterly unnecessary and unwarranted giving away 
of the Christian positions ceased. Nothing so pleases 
those who wish to " smash the churches," as to get 
a simple and sincere believer to pledge himself to 
the old "all or none" theory of inspiration. Dr. 

1 On this head Mr. G. Jackson in his instructive book " Studies 
in the Old Testament," well says, " How much longer one wonders 
is this kind of thing to last ? How much longer will our friends the 
literalists be content to fetch and carry for the Goliaths of rational- 
ism ? Does it never make them uneasy when they see that it is 
they who provide the grist for the sceptic's mill, that it is out of their 
arguments and their interpretations that some of faith's most in- 
veterate foes are forging their deadliest weapons against the religion 
of Christ?" (p. 144). 



THE APPRECIATION OF THE BIBLE? 181 

Monro Gibson has only expressed the truth in say- 
ing that — 

" There are multitudes of good earnest souls 
who do love the light, but have been forced 
into unbelief by the cruel demand that they 
must either accept every word of the Bible as 
coming direct from God, or reject the whole. 
They are too conscientious to say that they can 
accept every word ; so the only alternative left 
to them is to be done with it altogether." ] 

From such a cruel dilemma they are happily delivered 
by the principles of an honest and valid criticism. 
The summary of the negative gain suggested by 
Mr. Rhondda Williams in his timely little brochure 
entitled " Shall We Understand the Bible?" is thus 
entirely warranted : — 

"The fact is that the criticism much abused 
by the ignorant, and sometimes made the subject 
of poor jokes by men who have only touched its 
fringes with incompetent fingers, has effected 
the resurrection of the Bible into modern life. 
With the old theory, in face of rising modern 
science, nothing could have saved the Bible from 
falling into disuse. It would have been put 
upon the shelf as a discredited book. But 
criticism has shown it to be a well of living 
water, a literature teeming with points of vital 
interest for man." 2 

But the positive gains from the newer and truer 
appreciation of the Bible, are even more distinct and 
precious. What criticism has taken away of in- 
fallible detail, it has more than given back in reliable 

1 " Inspiration and Authority of Holy Scripture," p. 201. See 
also Dr. Sanday's valuable Bampton Lectures on Inspiration, 
pp. 428-431. 

2 p. 80. Published by A. & C. Black. 



182 ARE THE CHURCHES HELPING 

bulk. The times and circumstances and authorship 
of all the sixty-six portions of this wonderful litera- 
ture, are more clearly apprehended now than ever 
before. Such knowledge is an unmeasured help, 
not hindrance, to their right understanding and deep 
appreciation. As regards the Old Testament, words 
can scarcely express the difference between the old 
stereotyped view — which yet largely obtains — of a 
volume Divinely written in chronological order as 
we now know it, every part of it binding upon the 
human conscience for evermore, and the newer, 
truer understanding of it as the record of the gradual 
development in the minds of men, according to their 
capacity, of the knowledge of God and of themselves, 
along with ever-heightening ideals of conduct, char- 
acter and destiny. This difference can only be 
appreciated when the present order in which the 
Old Testament portions are bound up in our English 
Bibles is set aside, and an arrangement adopted 
which accords with the facts of histor}^. 1 But the 
effect may truly be likened to turning a plain photo- 
graph into a kinematograph ; or to the restoration 
of some old ruined castle, and peopling it with its 
former residents in all the varied activities of their 
daily life. 

As to the New Testament, it is well indeed that 

1 See a most helpful little booklet by Mr. C. H. Robinson, en- 
titled " Human Nature a Revelation of the Divine " (Longmans, 
sixpence, p. 24) where the author well asks, " Why could not a Bible 
be published by some recognized authority in which the different 
portions should be arranged according to the order of their com- 
position, as agreed upon by a consensus of more moderate critics ? 
If the Old Testament were made to begin with Amos, and to end 
with the books of Chronicles or Daniel, and if some indication were 
given in the text of the Pentateuch to suggest its composite origin, 
the English reader would find the Book as a whole far more easy to 
understand than it is at present." A good specimen of such attempt 
will be found in " The Old Testament Narrative Separated Out," 
by A. D. Sheffield (Constable, six shillings). 



THE APPRECIATION OF THE BIBLE? 183 

its whole contents should be cast into the crucible ; 
for only so could this generation possibly be assured 
of the substantial reliability of its most important 
parts. Even if that should mean the casting of 
a shadow of hesitation on the date and authorship 
of some of the minor portions, it would be unmistak- 
able gain. For it is upon the former that the 
foundations of the Christian faith undoubtedly rest. 
Thus, in regard to the first three or Synoptic Gospels, 
and the four greater letters of the Apostle Paul, we 
are more sure to-day of their genuineness and 
authenticity than the Church has ever been before. 1 
Even as to the Fourth Gospel which is still under 
discussion, whilst it cannot be concealed that the 
general consensus of scholarship is rather against 
than for the Apostolic authorship, 2 how far this is 
from being a necessary loss to faith may be stated 
in the words of one who holds that " the Fourth 

1 This is not the occasion for a critical review in detail, but the 
following may be taken as a fair and reliable statement of modern 
findings as to dates. For the Gospels, Matthew a.d. 70-90, Mark 
60-70, Luke 75-85, John 90-110. Whilst as to Paul's four letters, 
to Rome, Corinth and Galatia, they were written, almost beyond 
doubt, between a.d. 56 and 58. It is, however, pertinent to add that 
the very latest publication by Prof. Harnack is to the effect that not 
only was Luke genuinely the author of both the Gospel bearing his 
name and the Acts, but that they were both written before the fall 
of Jerusalem in a.d. 70 and whilst Paul was still alive. When all 
that this involves is appreciated, and correlated with the other re- 
liable results of modern criticism, it may be truly said that through 
its help the foundations of Christian belief are now established as 
firmly as history could reasonably be expected to make them. 

2 Yet it must by no means be considered as a closed question. 
Not only have we the deliberate conclusion — after most elaborate 
discussion — of the erudite Principal of Manchester College, Oxford 
(Dr. J. Drummond, an acknowledged Johannine expert) on behalf 
of the traditional authorship, but the last word on the matter is the 
emphatic pronouncement of Sir W. M. Ramsay, who ascribes the 
Fourth Gospel to " the personal knowledge, wide experience, intellect, 
character, and power, of John the Disciple ". 



184 ARE THE CHURCHES HELPING 

Evangelist remains for us the great Unknown of 
the New Testament ". 

" Thus he is not the chronicler but the in- 
spired interpreter of Christ, and has given us 
not a supplement to but an indispensable com- 
mentary on the earlier Gospels ; and while we 
would not miss what Mark and Luke have 
taught us concerning the Saviour's earthly 
life, His sayings and doings, yet without this, 
the spiritual Gospel, our knowledge of Christ, 
of God, would be immeasurably less." 1 

As regards those portions of the New Testament 
about which criticism is undecided, it must never 
be forgotten that provisional conclusions, accepted 
as such for the truth's sake, are far worthier from 
the Christian standpoint than traditional dogmatisms, 
however venerable, which are blindly held without 
concern as to their truth or untruth. 

Much more, however, might be truly said as to 
the actual gain, for all purposes of Christian faith, from 
the new as against the old appreciation of the Bible. 
It is not enough to affirm that it becomes a new 
Book. Its wonderfulness as a collection of religious 
literature only appears when it ceases to be in the 
old homogeneous sense the " Word of God ". In a 
volume directly derived from Deity, supposing it to 
be such, there would be nothing to marvel at. It 
would not indeed be so much an object of awe as 
any living creature. The marvel of the Bible only 
emerges when in the very humanness of this litera- 
ture which is so unquestionable to honest scrutiny, 

1 " What is the Bible ? " by Dr. Warschauer (Jas. Clarke & Co.). 
Not only is this volume a most valuable summary, for the average 
reader, of the modern situation in regard to the Bible as a whole, 
but in this particular case of the Fourth Gospel the real gain accruing 
from the thoroughness of careful scrutiny in face of traditional loss 
is succinctly expressed onipp. 230-32. 



THE APPRECIATION OF THE BIBLE? 185 

we find really the inworking of the Divine. In 
regard to the Old Testament, with its thirty-nine 
portions, proceeding from some forty or more dif- 
ferent writers, under all kinds of circumstances, and 
spread over at least seven or eight centuries, we 
have to account for the wondrous result expressed 
by so impartial a critic as Matthew Arnold : — 

"God was to Israel neither an assumption 
nor a metaphysical idea. He was the power not 
ourselves that makes for righteousness. Why 
should we study the Bible ? Why will not 
other books do as well ? Why ? Because this 
power is revealed in Israel and the Bible and 
not by other teachers and books. That is, there 
is infinitely more of Him there, He is plainer 
and easier to come at, and incomparably more 
impressive." * 

To which may be truly added what Mr. Snell has 
affirmed, viz. that "it is not too much to say that 
just as the principle of evolution has made natural 
history intelligible, so the Higher Criticism is mak- 
ing the history and literature of the Hebrew people 
intelligible ". 

But it is on the same principles of critical under- 
standing that the insufficiency of the Old Testament, 
as a world message for all time, becomes manifest, 
and, by contrast, the supremacy of Christ and the 
sufficiency of His Gospel are brought into relief. 

"The law," as the Apostle puts it, "was our 
schoolmaster to bring us to Christ." In coming to 
Him, the Christian Church learns what alone it can 
give to the world as the standard of moral values 
whereby human conduct and character are to be 
worthily estimated, whether in the Old Testament 
or in the daily newspaper. There were heroes and 

1 " Literature and Dogma," cheap edition, pp. 96, 98. 



1 86 ARE THE CHURCHES HELPING 

villains of old as there are villains and heroes to-day, 
but for the goodness exhibited, say, in the Psalms, 
or the badness portrayed with such lurid honesty in 
portions of the Pentateuch, just as for the nobility or 
wickedness around us now, the new appreciation of 
the Bible provides us with a better test than Ithu- 
riel's spear, when it points to Christ alone as "The 
Way, the Truth, and the Life ". 

O Lord and Master of us all, 
Whate'er our name or sign : 
We own Thy sway, we hear Thy call, 
We test our lives by Thine. 

Nor is that all. What more is brought home to 
Christian faith positively by criticism — " the new sit- 
uation of great interest and importance ; the com- 
ing method, destined to be characteristic of a period 
in the history of Biblical science " * — cannot be satis- 
factorily stated in few words. We have noted that 
for the modern Christian who is " coveting earnestly 
the best gift " of " understanding," and is open- 
minded as the Bereans to learn from any truth- 
bringing source, the loss of some of his " favourite 
passages," in the old sense, is more than compensated 
by the solidity of greater gains. The living reality 
of the great facts upon which ulimately his faith 
must rest, is now guaranteed to him as never before. 
So validly established are the main records of those 
facts, that he can afford to look with undisturbed 
equanimity, if not with pity, upon the mythical and 
mythological suggestions which continue sporadically 
to arise. If there be strong assertions from strange 
quarters as to the " collapse of historical Chris- 
tianity " 2 he can now, as never before, treat them 

1 Dr. W. N. Clarke, " Sixty Years, etc.," p. 173. 

2 As when the writer of a pamphlet under this title, who has 
become a lecturer to the same effect and contributor to the " R.P.A. 
Annual," persists in calling himself the " Rev. " R. Roberts. 



THE APPRECIATION OF THE BIBLE? 187 

with patience, because he knows both that in the 
New Testament his feet are on the rock, and that 
the rock is not in the air. 

But beyond this, in escaping from the well-meant 
but none the less real bondage of sharply defined 
theories and dogmatic definitions of inspiration, he 
enters upon an unprecedented perception and ap- 
preciation of the continuity of the influence of the 
Divine Spirit who moved the workers and inspired 
the writers of old. Bezaleel is brought down into 
common life to-day, and Pentecost ceases to be a 
thaumaturgic flash, becoming rather the gracious 
dawning of a day which has been and is ever growing 
brighter. Inspiration is quite as possible and may 
be just as real now, as ever during the first Christian 
century. If a confirmatory "passage" be desired, 
criticism gives us the assurance we need, without 
limitation, in removing the last two words of the 
familiar rendering of John in. 34 and telling the 
Church of every age whilst the world shall last, that 
" He whom God hath sent speaks the words of God ; 
for He gives not the spirit by measure ". 

The same correction of mistake indeed comes thus 
to pass in regard to the New Testament, as with the 
Lord's Prayer. All too long and too often have 
those simple but deep and significant sentences been 
repeated as if they were so complete and all-com- 
prehensive that their utterance was meant to cover 
the whole needs of all humanity for all ages. Yet 
Christ Himself gave no warrant for any such notion. 
Indeed, by implication, He teaches exactly the con- 
trary. He said distinctly " after this manner" pray 
ye ; thus giving not a model prayer to be repeated, 
but a pattern of prayer to follow. The truest ap- 
preciation therefore, of His lesson, is not in repeating 
the words as often as we do, but in putting the 
same naturalness, and humility, and reality, into our 



188 ARE THE CHURCHES HELPING 

own communings with God. So in regard to the 
New Testament. Instead of its being a closed 
system of spiritual truth never to be altered, never 
lessened, never increased, 1 it is but the initial stage 
of that real inspiration of all true disciples which 
Jesus Himself unequivocally promised ; and pro- 
mised without any intimation that it was to be 
restricted to the little band of bewildered men to 
whom He said " When He the Spirit of truth is 
come, He shall abide with you for ever . . . He shall 
take of Mine, and shall show it unto you ". If we 
read with greatest profit, and account really in- 
spired, the writings of the Apostle who was not 
included in that group ; so to the end of time will 
there be others, as there have been during all the 
ages past, who, according to their souls' development 
and communion with their Master, will speak living 
truth to their respective generations. Well says 
Dr. W. N. Clarke :— 

" I was right in holding the Bible as a unique 
Book, uniquely precious ; but when one thinks 
of the living God, near to His human creatures 
and the same for evermore, it cannot be that 
He has given men no word of revelation from 
Himself since it was finished. To know God 
as Jesus has revealed Him, is to know better 
than that." 2 

To "pass from the using of the Bible in the light 
of its statements, to using it in the light of its 

1 Of all the pitiful misconceptions to which traditional notions 
lead the average believer, perhaps no one is more common than 
the practice of quoting the words in the concluding chapter of 
Revelation as applying to the whole Bible — " If any man shall add 
unto . . . shall take away from . . . the words of the book of this pro- 
phecy, etc." Whereas it is a mere accident of canonical arrangement 
which puts them in this position. To apply them to all that precedes 
between the covers of the Bible, is simple dishonesty. 

2 " Sixty Years, etc.," p. 149. 



THE APPRECIATION OF THE BIBLE? 189 

principles " — is to pass from the mental feebleness 
of childhood to the strength and liberty of manhood. 
For all who experience such development, the Bible 
becomes doubly precious. It is not only a record 
of religious history on which in all essential matters 
we may rely for our instruction, but it is a reminder 
of the Divine immanence from which we may draw 
unending inspiration. It means and teaches not 
only that God was in Jesus revealing Himself to the 
first Christians, but that he has been ever since, and 
still is, revealing Himself, through the Spirit of 
Whom Jesus spoke, to every individual who 
cherishes an open mind and cultivates a pure heart. 
The New Testament thus becomes at once the only 
true interpreter of the Old Covenant, and the unmis- 
takable pointer to the perpetuation of the New. 
The progressive revelation of God which makes 
itself manifest throughout the older writings, does 
not cease when we have appreciated Gospels and 
Epistles. The mission of Jesus embraces no longer 
a nation, but the whole world of humanity. It in- 
vites not a priesthood, but every child of man, into 
communion and co-operation with God Himself. 

6. But the real and abiding gains which thus accrue 
from turning upon the Bible the fierce yet necessary 
light of modern knowledge, are much more consider- 
able than can be expressed in a few words. They 
must be seen and known, to be appreciated. 

" What the Bible teaches through its large 
revealing, may be something different from what 
it says in its various statements. Certainly 
what it teaches in this large way is different 
from what it says in some of its statements. In 
my later years I have had to look beyond the 
sayings to the teaching." 1 

1 Dr. W. N. Clarke, " Sixty Years, etc.," p. 247. 



190 ARE THE CHURCHES HELPING 

What Dr. Clarke thus avows for himself, ought to 
be the inspiring experience of every fully developed 
Christian. It is the " treasure hid in a field " which 
every honest and diligent student finds as his reward. 
But whether the reward be less or more ; whether 
the patience brings the comfort sooner or later ; in a 
word, let the consequences be what they may, the 
Christian Church is pledged only and wholly to 
what is true. The whole truth is not }^et known 
concerning all the contents of this wondrous litera- 
ture. But what is known points with no wavering 
hand to the conviction that both extremes in regard 
to it are false. It is neither a flawless, infallible, 
all-comprehensive, final oracle ; nor is it an ordinary 
collection of religious writings coming into existence 
at the mere whim of superstitious men, and collected 
together by the mere hap of events. As for the latter 
alternative, it was Max Mtiller who said with scholarly 
impartiality, " If you would know the superiority 
of your Bible, compare it with the other sacred books 
of the East ". Whilst as to the former, the position 
for which in his day Dr. Momerie was persecuted 
by his co-religionists, is now, beyond all doubt that 
merits regard, acknowledged to be the true attitude 
for every impartial thinker : — 

"To most people there seems no middle 
course between worshipping the Bible as a 
fetish, and regarding it with contempt. But 
there is a middle course, and as usual the middle 
course is the right course. I propose to show 
you that the Bible, though not infallible, is none 
the less inspired." : 

Such rational treatment of the Bible is the only true 
treatment, therefore it alone is the Christian method ; 
it alone is alike worthy of God and man ; it alone 

1 " Essays on the Bible," p. 1 1 1. 



THE APPRECIATION OF THE BIBLE? 191 

will survive the tests of passing time and growing 
knowledge ; it alone will help the coming of the 
Kingdom of Heaven upon earth. 

7. Yet it must never be forgotten that the final 
and supreme question of all is a practical one. 
Amidst all our modern growth of knowledge and the 
state of flux which inevitably follows, in the realm of 
religion as in all other realms, the one great matter 
which the Christian Church has to bear in mind above 
everything else, is that the ultimate test of its whole 
position is found in life and character. That is to 
say, the worth of the Bible, both to the Church and 
to the world of men, turns not upon any theory of 
inspiration nor any result of criticism, not indeed 
upon anything in or about the Bible itself, but upon 
the use made of it by those who profess to regard it 
as Divinely inspired. What, in a word, is the effect 
upon conduct and character, of the belief that this 
collection of writings differs from all others in the 
speciality of its inspiration and the weight of its 
authority ? That question is still, as it has always 
been, at once the final test and the greatest difficulty. 
It is, however, a clear-minded, tender-hearted, wholly 
sympathetic observer who feels bound in these days 
to give his deliberate judgement thus : — 

"It cannot, I think, be questioned that the 
striking contrast between the lives of Christians 
and the rules which they profess to accept is the 
great religious difficulty of the present day. . . . 
The same defect which made men resolve to 
reform Christianity in the sixteenth century, 
makes them condemn or reject it in the 
twentieth ; and that defect is its supposed 
ineffectiveness as a guide and motive of con- 
duct. The attitude of the people to the Churches 
to-day is not determined by higher criticism 



192 ARE THE CHURCHES HELPING 

or questions of ceremonial — though indifference 
is probably confirmed by the way we manage 
these controversies — but by the unsatisfactory 
lives of professing Christians." 1 

It is no less false than futile to dismiss this pro- 
test on the ground that it is pessimistic. The facts 
to which appeal is here made are not lessened, let 
alone made void, by the usual wave of the optimistic 
hand. Nine-tenths of the people of this " Christian " 
country never read the Bible at all, now. If the 
remaining tenth is sincerely and strongly persuaded 
that this volume is in any real sense the "word of 
God," then the justification of their belief will have 
to be expressed in deeds, not words ; in lives, not in 
books ; in conduct and character, not in eulogies of 
the " Authorized " Version, or eloquent appeals on 
behalf of the Bible Society. The final and only 
sufficing proof of inspiration for each man's own 
soul must be that a right understanding of the Scrip- 
tures inspires him to all that he knows to be best 
and purest, noblest and divinest. But only the 
exhibition of that inspiration in corresponding 
character — whether on the part of a man, a church, 
or a nation — will avail as a witness to the modern 
world of humanity. It is in this age quite useless 
for the Churches to emphasize dogmas concerning 
inspiration, unless there be a level of character 
superior to that maintained by those to whom in- 
spiration is a fiction. So long, therefore, as there 
is in the public services of Christian Churches, 
mechanical routine, superstitious formalism, mean- 
ingless verbosity ; and in the private lives of Chris- 
tians, selfishness and pride, pettiness and caste, 
narrow-mindedness and bigotry ; it will be to the 
modern world only a sham and a mockery to multi- 

1 " Bampton Lectures for 1907," J. H. F. Peile, pp. 6, 17. 



THE APPRECIATION OF THE BIBLE? 193 

ply references to the Bible as " the living Word of 
God"; or expatiate upon the grand style and " ex- 
quisite English" of "the good old Book" of 161 1 ; 
or drop sinister hints and multiply denunciations 
concerning the dangers of the Higher Criticism. 

Ruskin's words may be brusque, but his vision 
was clear-sighted when he wrote — to a class of re- 
ligionists by no means yet extinct : — 

"You women of England are all shrieking 
with one voice, you and your clergymen to- 
gether, because you hear of your Bible being 
attacked. If you chose to obey your Bibles, 
you would not mind who attacked them. It is 
just because you never fulfil a single downright 
precept of the Book, that you are so careful 
about its credit ; and just because you do not 
care to obey its whole words, that you are so 
careful about the letter of them. The Bible 
tells you to dress plainly, and you are mad for 
finery ; the Bible tells you to have pity on the 
poor, and you crush them under your carriage 
wheels ; the Bible tells you to do justice, and 
you do not know nor care to know what the 
Bible word justice means. Do but learn what 
so much of God's truth as that comes to — and 
then this critical study of the Bible — this ' attack 
on the Bible ' as you wrongly call it — will cause 
you no further anxiety." 

When all is written or said hereupon, the only 
valid and final proof for the modern world that the 
Christian's Bible is really divinely inspired, is a 
community of inspired men and women. What the 
Bible, therefore, needs to-day is neither eulogy nor 
apology ; but the witness of those who from a right 
understanding of it, embody its spiritual principles 
in their lives, and, as living epistles known and read 

13 



194 ARE THE CHURCHES HELPING 

of all men, incarnate in all their dealings with their 
fellows, its worthiest precepts and loftiest ideals. 
The greatest need of all for the modern appreciation 
of the Bible, is the answer to Spitta's prayer through- 
out all the Churches : — 

Lord, endue thy word from Heaven 
With such light, and love, and power, 

That in us its silent leaven 

May work on from hour to hour. 

Give us grace to bear our witness 

To the truths we have embraced ; 
And let others both their sweetness 

And their quickening virtue taste. 

Books Illustrative of two Preceding Sections. 

Inspiration (Bampton Lecture for 1903), by Dr. W. Sanday. Long- 
mans. 7s. 6d. 

The Bible : Its Meaning and Supremacy, by the late Dean Farrar. 
Longmans. 6s. 

The Bible : Its Origin and Nature, by Dr. Marcus Dods. T. & T. 
Clark. 4s. 6d. 

Inspiration and the Bible, by Dr. R. F. Horton. Fisher Unwin. 
3s. 6d. 

The Bible and its Inspiration, by Dr. G. S. Barrett. Jarrold. 2s. 

Genesis— The Century Bible, by Dr. W. H. Bennet. T. & E. Jack. 
2s. 6d. 

Shall we understand the Bible? by T. R. Williams. A. & C. 
Black, is. 

An Introduction to the Scriptures — The Temple Bible — by the Bishop 
of Ripon. Dent & Co. is. 

Gain or Loss ? by B. J. Snell. Jas. Clarke, is. 

The Higher Criticism— Three Papers, by Drs. C. S. Driver and 
A. Kirkpatrick. Hodder & Stoughton. is. 

Some Thoughts on Inspiration, by Dr. J. A. Robinson. Long- 
mans. 6d. 

Evolution and the Holy Scriptures, by Dr. J. M. Wilson. S.P.C.K. 
6d. 

Problems of Religion and Science, by Dr. J. M. Wilson. Mac- 
millan. 6d. 

The Story of the Beginning, by Mrs. F. Green. Wells, Gardner. 9d. 

Clarion Fallacies, by Dr. F. Ballard. Hodder & Stoughton. is. 

Holy Scripture and Criticism, by Dr. H. Ryle. Macmillan. 4s. 6d. 



THE APPRECIATION OF THE BIBLE? 195 

The Century Bible — separate vols., by various Authors. T. Jack. 

2s. 6d. 
The New Testament in Modern Speech, by Dr. Weymouth. J. 

Clarke. 2s. 6d. 
The New Appreciation of the Bible, by Dr. Selleck. Fisher Un- 

win. 6s. 
Sixty Years with the Bible, by Dr. W. N. Clarke. T. & T. Clark. 

4s. 6d. 
The Witness of Israel, by W. J. Moulton. C. Kelly. 3s. 6d. 
The Law and the Prophets, by Dr. Westphal. Macmillan. 8s. 6d. 
The Inspiration and Authority of Holy Scripture, by Dr. M. Gibson. 

T. Law. 2s. 6d. 
Biblical Criticism and Modern Thought, by Dr. W. Jordan. T. & T. 

Clark. 7s. 6d. 
Early Traditions of Genesis, by Dr. A. R. Gordon. T. & T. Clark. 

7s. 6d. 
Studies in the Old Testament, by G. Jackson. C. Kelly. 3s. 6d. 
Modern Criticism and the Preaching of the Old Testament, by Dr. 

G. A. Smith. Hodder & Stoughton. 6s. 
The Bible in Modern Light (Part III of The People's Religious Diffi- 
culties), by Dr. F. Ballard. C. Kelly. 6d. 
Old Testament Criticism and the Christian Church, by J. E. 

McFadyen. Hodder & Stoughton. 6s. 
The Old Testament and Modern Research, by J. R. Cohu. J. Parker. 

3s. 6d. 
The Gospels and Modern Research, by J. R. Cohu. J. Parker. 

4s. 6d. 
The Value of the Old Testament, by B. J. Snell. Jas. Clarke. 

2s. 6d. 
The Inspiration of the Bible, by V. J. Storr. Simpkin. 6d. 
Human Nature a Revelation of the Divine — in the Old Testament. 

C. H. Robinson. Longmans. 6d. 
Evolution and the Fall, by Dr. F. J. Hall. Longmans. 5s. 
The Use of the Scriptures in Theology, Dr. W. N. Clarke. T. & T. 

Clark. 3s. 6d. 



IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 



" Twenty-five years ago I had a rude awakening from my agnosticism 
and materialism. I was down from the university with my parents for 
the long vacation. I slept soundly, but awoke suddenly with a vision of 
my father crossing an iron bridge to which he alone had access, and in 
front of him, partially obscured, was a gap some four feet wide ; but he 
walked on regardless of the danger. I jumped up, dressed, found my 
father was out, and went for his assistant. He accompanied me to the 
only bridge that answered the description, two miles up the river. We 
were just in time to stop my father, who was calmly walking to destruc- 
tion. I mention the bare facts. They do not prove man's immortality, 
but they do establish the existence of some unseen power, intelligent and 
endowed with knowledge transcending mortals, and able to impart that 
knowledge. The subject was a healthy undergraduate, not at all dreamy, 
with all the impudent contempt of youth for anything bordering upon the 
occult." — " Is Death the End ? " By a well-known writer. 

" I am, for all personal purposes, convinced of the persistence of human 
existence beyond bodily death, and though I am unable to justify that 
belief in the full and complete manner, yet it is a belief which has been 
produced by scientific evidence that is based upon facts and experience." — 

Sir Oliver Lodge. 

" I must say that to my own mind the survival after death has such 
strong evidence from so many sides, as to be entirely convincing, and 
much above the evidence required in a court of law." 

— Principal Graham, " Dalton Hall ". 

" When I look over the whole field of the phenomena, and consider the 
suppositions that must be made to escape spiritism, which not only one 
aspect of the case, but every incidental feature of it strengthens, I see no 
reason except the suspicion of my neighbours for withholding assent." 

— Prof. Hyslop. 

" Let us take the case of Mrs. Piper, who again and again has given 
astounding examples of communications from some unseen source, the 
only possible explanation of which is that they are from the departed 
spirit. The question of fraud in her case naturally was raised, and it was 
carefully considered by a committee of astute men. Their unanimous 
opinion was that no system of fraud could account for the phenomena. 
That vigorous critic Mr. Podmore, said ' The theory of fraud could not 
be stretched sufficiently to cover the case. The real proof that fraud is 
not the explanation, lies in the nature of the revelations actually made'." 
— " Is Death the End ? " By a well-known writer. 

" The investigation and testing of the facts has disproved, on experi- 
mental grounds, the supposition that the existence of mind depends on the 
mechanism of nerve and brain, as physiological science understands those 
terms. 

" No ; the more love grows, the more it feels it can grow ; the more 
knowledge grows, the more clearly we hear deeps calling unto deeps wait- 
ing to be known. In short the meaning and purpose of man's intellectual 
and moral endowments are on a scale immeasurably larger than the needs 
of this brief life demand." — S. H. Mellone, M.A., D.Sc. 



199 



CHAPTER VII 
IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 

The three subjects which have probably interested 
and perplexed the human mind more than any other, 
are God, freedom, and immortality. So much, indeed, 
has been spoken and written concerning them, that 
it seems impossible to suggest anything fresh or 
final. At successive epochs men of unusual gifts 
have made more or less impressive contributions to 
their apprehension. Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Paul, 
Origen, Augustine, Luther, Calvin, Kant, Lotze, 
Edwards, and a host of others, down to the late 
Prof. W. James, spent themselves freely on these 
high themes. Yet for the majority of men they 
still remain amongst the uncertainties. Just now, 
those who are most anxious to escape the thraldom 
of a naturalism which is virtually materialism, are 
looking to Profs. Eucken of Germany and Bergson 
of France. If for this country the name of Dr. A. R. 
Wallace, or Sir Oliver Lodge, is added, we have 
a modern spiritual prophet for each of the three 
greatest nations of the world. The very least that 
can be said about their protests, is that they are 
timely. They voice the fact that an unmistakable 
reaction has set in against the aggressive material- 
ism of the last century, and this reaction bids fair 
to continue and develop, in spite of the flood of 
cheap reprints, and translations of Haeckel, which 
the Rationalist Press Association has poured over 
this country during the last few years. 

If, however, this reaction be called " spiritual," it 



200 IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 

must be with a connotation differing from the usual 
Christian significance of that term. From the 
Christian standpoint the scientific rebound from 
matter to force, or energy, leaves much to be de- 
sired. But patience may well prevail, seeing that, 
as represented by creeds and churches, Christianity 
itself is undergoing such modifications as have never 
been conceived before. It is plain beyond all con- 
troversy, that much in the name of Christian re- 
ligion has to be unlearned, and much to be learned. 
That a "new theology," in some sober sense, has to 
be wrought out, every honest and intelligent student 
knows well. What changes are now taking place 
and will yet come to pass in so-called " orthodoxy," 
we need not here consider. It is enough to affirm 
that whatever influence upon Christian belief may 
be exercised by historical and critical studies, the 
three main elements above named will always re- 
main as immovable foundations. Christianity with- 
out God, freedom, and immortality, is unthinkable. 
Canon Henson has well said that it is useless to 
preach the Gospel, unless we can postulate theism 
and moral responsibility. But he might as truly 
have added, that even if we could assume these 
without question — which to-day assuredly we can- 
not — no Gospel could justify its name to men unless 
it held out unmistakable promise of good in a life to 
come, as well as in the life that now is. 

The modern religious situation is so complex, and 
the atmosphere such a veritable Babel of opinions, 
that any attempt at a truthful summary is specially 
difficult. From the point of view of Christian 
ethics, no less than of theology, the three — God, 
freedom, and immortality are inseparable. But in 
the interests of clear thought each may and must 
be considered apart from the others. Dismissing, 
therefore, the two former, brief but valid answers to 



IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 201 

the following inquiries may be of service as stepping 
stones to conviction in the swirl of modern currents 
of thought. What do we mean by immortality? 
What is truly to be said on its behalf? What may 
be said against it ? What is the resultant attitude 
of science and philosophy at the present time? 
What is the contribution of theism ? What is the 
weight and worth of all that is pertinent concerning 
Jesus Christ ? What is the ultimate position of 
modern Christian belief? These are the queries 
which must be faced, and which cannot but bring 
in their wake some practical inferences. 

What do we mean by immortality ? 

Ordinary reference to a "hereafter," even by 
thoughtful people, is always more or less ambigu- 
ous. The main question involved may be stated in 
a variety of ways. Is man merely mortal ? Is man 
immortal? Is death the end of all? Has man an 
immortal soul? Is man a never-dying soul ? Some 
of these forms of inquiry will not bear scrutiny, and 
on the whole it is, perhaps, best, as Dr. McTaggart 
suggests, to adopt the simple but comprehensive 
question — Are men immortal ? Even this, however, 
really contains two queries which it is most import- 
ant to distinguish. Does the human self survive 
death ? Does it continue to exist for ever by reason 
of its very nature ? Undoubtedly, in general par- 
lance, our word " immortality " stands for an affirm- 
ation of both of these. But the second by no means 
follows necessarily from the first. Nor is the 
Christian Church by any means unanimous con- 
cerning it, for whilst one theologian of eminence 
says that : — 

" Man is immortal, i.e. the human personal- 
ity is undying. The spirit is the person, and 



202 IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 

what is here affirmed is that the human spirit, 
with its essential powers in which it resembles 
God, is destined to live on endlessly. A human 
being will never cease to be a human being : " 1 
another in equally high repute writes that — 

"The doctrine of the immortality of the soul, 
i.e. the essential and endless permanence of all 
human souls, so prominent in the teaching of 
Plato, has no place in the teaching of Christ 
and His Apostles." 2 

It is not here our task to enter upon the discussion 
of this difference, beyond pointing out that any real 
conception of literal eternity, or duration for ever, 
is impossible to mortal minds. Certainly the usual 
Greek word avwvios does not connote it. Nor, in our 
own language, is " eternal " by any means the 
synonym for " everlasting ". The former term is 
indeed primarily qualitative, not quantitative, and no 
greater mistake has been made in the whole history 
of New Testament exegesis, than to explain or refer 
to the word " eternal " as simply meaning lasting for 
ever. The attempt to grasp and define the condi- 
tions of absolute eternity, is no more necessary, for 
Christian thought than possible to the human mind. 
All we can do is all we need do, viz. apprehend the 
actuality of persistence. From the standpoint of 
scientific research Sir Oliver Lodge indeed asserts 
that " a really existent thing can never perish, but 
only change its form ". Whether the human spirit, 
or self, or soul, comes into the category of existent 
things, may be open to question. But the general 
statement is both pertinent and sufficient. 

" If all that really exists, in the highest sense, 
is immortal, we have only to ask whether our 

x Dr. W. N. Clarke, "Outline of Christian Theology," p. 192. 
2 "The Immortality of the Soul," Dr. J. A. Beet, p. 36. 



IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 203 

personality, our character, our self, is sufficiently 
individual, sufficiently characteristic, sufficiently 
developed, in a word sufficiently real — for if it 
is, there can then be no doubt of its real con- 
tinuance. It may return, indeed in some sense 
to the central store, but not without identity ; 
its individual character will be preserved." ! 

The question of questions, therefore, leaving 
aside the possibilities of an infinite future, is whether 
the event of death puts a final end to our existence 
as persons. And apart from the philosophical sug- 
gestion just quoted, the unequivocal and unmistak- 
able answer of Christian faith is — No. Its conviction 
is that whatever moral qualities or consequences be 
involved, man who is man is here and now a person ; 
and his personality endures when the physical organ- 
ism through which it is now known, alike to himself 
and others, is dissolved by death. Death, then, so 
far from being the end of all, is but the true begin- 
ning of a new and larger life whose end is beyond 
our conception. 

On natural grounds what is to be said for such 
a belief? 

The following items of answer merit, of course, 
much more extended development than is here pos- 
sible. Yet a brief summary has its advantages in 
enabling us more clearly to apprehend their total 
united force. 

1. The instinctive clinging to life which distin- 
guishes all living creatures, is much more signifi- 
cant in man than in any other animals, even the 
highest vertebrates. Amongst lower or less highly 
organized creatures, the dread of death is probably 
nothing more than reflex action through heredity. 

1 " Man and the Universe," Sir Oliver Lodge, p. 178. 



204 IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 

But in man it is a definitely thoughtful clinging to 
existence, which is based equally upon conviction 
and desire. It is easy to say that there is nothing 
but the desire to warrant the conviction. But that 
is neither the whole truth, nor is the desire to be 
lightly dismissed as superficial sentimentality. It is 
far too real, too universal, too deep, too strong, to 
be airily set aside as insignificant. When we read 
that we are — 

Not only cunning casts in clay : 

Let Science prove we are, and then 
What matters Science unto men, 

At least to me ? I would not stay. 

the protest is not to be contemned because it is 
poetry. Reality is by no means confined to mathe- 
matics and statistics. Mr. Fiske affirms with reason 
that "The faith in immortal life is the great poetic 
achievement of the human mind ; it is all-pervasive ". 
Nor is there any exaggeration in his further avowal 
that 

"The destruction of this sublime poetic con- 
ception would be like depriving a planet of its 
atmosphere ; it would leave nothing but a moral 
desert, as cold and dead as the savage surface 
of the moon." 1 

It must be confessed that one meets occasionally 
with men and women who talk as if extinction would 
be a boon. But it can hardly be said that such in- 
dividuals have exhibited the best type of living, even 
here and now. Certainly, they do not speak for the 
rest of humanity, else the proportion of suicides 
instead of being a trifle, would be an enormous 
majority. In this respect it is much more than 
probable that the candid confession of Prof. Huxley, 

1 " Life Everlasting," p. 18. 



IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 205 

in his letter to Mr. J. Morley, is what the average 
man feels dimly and the best men and women ever 
feel most strongly. Said he — 

" It is a curious thing that I find my dislike 
to the thought of extinction increasing as I get 
older, and nearer the goal. It flashes across 
me at all sorts of times with a kind of horror, 
that in 1900 I shall probably know no more of 
what is going on, than I did in 1800. I had 
sooner be in hell a good deal — at any rate in 
one of the upper circles where the climate and 
company are not too trying." x 

2. The conviction — as something more than mere 
longing — that man does not wholly die at death, 
has not only been practically universal, so that one 
may truly say — " belief in a future life is a vital part 
of the experience of mankind," but it has been most 
earnestly held and taught by many of the greatest 
minds, both ancient and modern. The teachings of 
Socrates and Plato hereupon, are too well known to 
need statement. Shakespeare is also too familiar to 
call for quotation. But not every one knows that 
Goethe, Germany's greatest intellect, expressed 
himself so strongly : — 

"At the age of seventy-five one must of 
course think sometimes of death. But the 
thought never gives me the least uneasiness, 
for I am fully convinced that our spirit is a 
being of a nature quite indestructible, and that 
its activity continues from eternity to eternity." 

Volumes could be filled with such testimonies. 
They do not amount to a proof of immortality ; but 
they do show that if it is a delusion, it is a colossal 
one. 

1 " Life and Letters," Vol. II, p. 67. 



206 IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 

3. Leaving poetry and intuition, so as to give 
full heed to modern science, it must be plainly 
affirmed that inasmuch as we do not know what life 
is, we cannot possibly know what its opposite, death, 
is or does. All that the most exact modern science 
permits us to say about life, is, that it is "the power 
which directs the movements of bioplasm ". Or, in 
Sir Oliver Lodge's deliberate words of affirmation, 
11 Life is something outside the scheme of mechanics, 
outside the categories of matter and energy, though 
it can nevertheless control or direct material forces "- 1 

Even Prof. Haeckel has to admit that " structures 
are not the efficient causes of the life process, but 
products of it ". That being so, and all we know of 
death being that it is the cessation of life, we have 
not advanced a step beyond the position of the 
writers of "The Unseen Universe," some thirty 
years ago, when they affirmed that "none of us 
know anything whatever about death ". In such 
case, there is plainly no warrant whatever for affirm- 
ing that it is necessarily the end of the existence of 
the individual. 

4. The assertion of materialism, or Haeckel's 
monism, that the human self, or soul, or ego, is 
nothing more than a development from the body, the 
product of complex organization, the " function of the 
phronema," will not bear scientific scrutiny. Of 
personality we may and must say that it is the bed- 
rock, or ultimate reality, of human existence. But 
no subtlety of speech, or thought, can make this self 
to be a material entity, or derive its reality from the 
material brain. James Mill was quite warranted in 
the declaration that no man has any right to say 
that he has seen his brother when he meets him in 
the street. He has seen a body, a material form, 

1 " Life and Matter," cheap edition, p. 78. 



IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 207 

and nothing more. But there is something more, 
or else one body would never be aware of the exist- 
ence of another body. In short, the human self, 
or spirit, or personality, is both real and spiritual, 
as distinct from material. Seeing, then, that all we 
know about death is that it is the dissolution of the 
body, there is no warrant whatever for assuming 
that it is also the destruction of the soul. One might 
as well insist that the destruction of Kubelik's violin 
would involve the annihilation of Kubelik. 

5. Some years ago, when materialism was in its 
heyday, Dr. Joseph Cook of Boston openly de- 
clared — 

" Show me by physiological argument that the 
soul is an agent external to the mechanism of 
the nervous system, and you have proved that 
the relation of the soul to the body is that of 
a harper to a harp, or a rower to a boat. And 
in showing that, you have removed, I affirm, 
not only a great but the greatest obstacle to the 
belief in immortality." 

Such an affirmation is more fully justified now 
than it was then. For more exact physiological 
research, confirmed by psychology and metaphysics, 
has made more clear and sure than ever the basis of 
Dr. Cook's assertion. The last word of expert 
physiology is to this effect : — 

"We have definitely concluded, then, that the 
facts both of brain anatomy and of brain 
physiology, indicate that this organ of the 
personality is never more than its instrument, 
whilst the personality itself is as different and 
as separate from it, as the violinist is separate 
from and not the product of his violin." l 

1 " Brain and Personality," Dr. W> H. Thomson, p. 234. 



208 IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 

All we know of death is that it is the dissolution 
and disintegration of the body, including the brain. 
But that no argument whatever can be drawn from 
such physical dissolution to the cessation of the per- 
sonality, is manifest from a twofold consideration. 
We know not only that the brain is not the mind, 
or self; but that there is no apprehensible con- 
nexion at all between the brain and the mind. The 
ultimate rinding of psychological physiology is what 
is termed " psycho-physical parallelism ■". * But this 
distinctly acknowledges two separate series of pheno- 
mena, mental and physical, material and immaterial, 
running on lines as parallel indeed, but also as 
separate, as two trains on distinct lines of metal. 
The reader of these words is thus performing every 
moment, a veritable miracle of transformation, before 
which science is absolutely dumb. For all that is 
presented to his vision is a series of black marks on 
white paper — whereby another series of molecular 
vibrations is set up in his cerebral cortex. But 
these vibrations are no more ideas than the moon 
is. It is the thinking self which transforms such 
material shakes into immaterial thoughts. In so 
doing it is as distinct from the apparatus of optic 
nerves and cerebral convolutions, as the manipulator 
of the " monotype " printing machine is from that 
upon which he operates. Nay, more so. For the con- 
nexion between the manipulator and the monotype 
is both causal and demonstrable. But neither of 
these can be affirmed of the relation between mole- 
cular vibration in the cerebral cortex, and the per- 
ception of ideas or formation of resolutions. The 
destruction of the brain is, therefore, no more proof 
of the end of the self, than the destruction of the 
monotype would mean that the operator was dead. 

1 See Dr. Stout's " Manual of Psychology," chap. in. " Body and 
Mind ". 



IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 209 

6. If human existence is to have any meaning 
above and beyond the mere fact of physical exist- 
ence, it seems impossible to regard the present life 
as final ; its incompleteness is at once so manifest 
and so tragic. It is hard, indeed, as Mr. Fiske says, 
to believe that nature will put us to "permanent 
intellectual confusion " by trampling upon all that is 
best within men, as of no account, or casting as 
11 rubbish to the void " all that distinguishes man's 
nature from that of the beasts below him. When 
one thinks of human nature's wondrous scope, and 
estimates it, as in this case we are bound to do, by 
its best specimens, it is surely impossible to think 
that its capacities shall have no further chance of 
developing than the few years of life on this earth 
afford. As Principal Caird put it : — 

" Man's intellectual and moral endowments 
are on a scale immeasurably larger than the 
needs of this brief life demand, or than is re- 
quired for any attainments in knowledge and 
goodness which even the noblest and best of 
men reach in their earthly existence ; and there- 
fore we can only account for the disproportion 
by the conception of a future life in which these 
endowments shall find adequate scope and 
employment." * 

One might as well be asked to believe that a 
magnificent organ, with a hundred stops, was erected 
just to play on it the Old Hundredth with one finger, 
as to think that man's possibilities of self-realization 
are exhausted in this little mortal life. The reason 
undoubtedly why many well-known words of Tenny- 
son's noblest poem have been so often quoted, is 
that they so truly express, with tender strength, the 

1 " Fundamental Ideas of Christianity," 11. p. 263. 
14 



210 IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 

most inextinguishable and surely the noblest long- 
ing of humanity : — 

The wish that of the living whole, 
No life shall fail beyond the grave, 
Derives it not from what we have, 

The likest God within the soul ? 

From the standpoint of nature alone how can 
less be said than this : — 

And he, shall he, 

Man, her last work, who seemed so fair, 
Such splendid purpose in his eyes, 
Who rolled the psalm to wintry skies, 

And built him fanes of fruitless prayer. 

Who loved, who suffered countless ills, 
Who battled for the true, the just ; 
Be blown about the desert dust, 

Or sealed within the iron hills, 

No more ? A monster then, a dream, 
A discord ; dragons of the prime, 
That tear each other in their slime, 

Were mellow music matched with him. 

7. Nor is this quenchless yearning to be loftily 
dismissed by " thanatists," on the ground that it is 
" only poetry ". Poetry can on occasion be an iron 
hand in a velvet glove. It is very far from being a 
synonym for feebleness. In the present case, its 
light is rather intensified than dimmed when we 
turn to modern science. The latest expression of 
this, we know, is in the word evolution. But if any- 
thing be beyond controversy in the vast realm of 
thought which this term suggests, surely it is that 
(i) evolution stands for an immeasurably long pro- 
cess upwards, in the sense of advancing from the 
simpler to the more complex, from the lower to the 
higher. And (ii), that the highest, crowning result 
of that process is not only human nature, but human 
nature at its best. So far, then, as we now know, the 



IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 211 

end is the true and only explanation of the begin- 
ning. But is this the end of all ? In Mr. Fiske's 
words, as a pronounced evolutionist : — 

"The question then is reduced to this: are 
man's highest spiritual qualities into the pro- 
duction of which all this creative energy has 
gone, to disappear with the rest ? Has all this 
work been done for nothing ? Is it all epheme- 
ral, all a bubble that bursts, a vision that fades ? 
On such a view, the riddle of the universe be- 
comes a riddle without a meaning. The more 
thoroughly we comprehend that process of 
evolution by which all things have come to be 
what they are, the more we are likely to feel 
that to deny the everlasting permanence of the 
spiritual element in man, is to rob the whole 
process of its meaning." 1 

If human individuality perishes at death, then the 
whole race in a few years — few as geologic time 
goes — will be reduced to a clutched soap bubble ; 
and the entire process of development, from the 
primordial nebulosity to Shakespeare, Gladstone, 
Jesus Christ, will have counted for no more than the 
striking of a match to light a city arab's pilfered 
cigarette. In such case naturalism and pessimism 
are one. 

8. When proof is demanded, prior to any belief 
in immortality, it is only necessary to apprehend the 
full significance of the term, to see how unreason- 
able is such an expectation. Mere continuity of 
existence is by no means all that is intended, but 
manifestly, by how much a future after death may be 
expected to exceed the experience of a life " cribbed, 
cabined, and confined " as this is by bodily limita- 
tions, by so much is it naturally impossible to pre- 

1 " Man's Destiny," pp. 114, 115. 



212 IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 

sent any clear conception, let alone demonstration 
of it. The caterpillar might as reasonably be asked 
for proof of its future wings, as human thought for 
demonstration of a larger non-cerebral existence. 
But on such impossibility, to found an argument 
against the reality of any such existence would be 
tantamount to affirming that no winged insect could 
ever possibly come from a crawling caterpillar. Un- 
less we had seen it, who could have believed it ? But 
when we have seen that the wonderful and beautiful 
dragon-fly, with its four and twenty thousand eyes 
and gauzy, iridescent, flashing wings, has emerged 
from its unpromising larval condition through de- 
velopment under water in the mud, it does not use 
up much faith to regard death as but the introduction 
of man — the immeasurably higher creature — to a 
correspondingly broader, brighter, stage of existence. 
We may at least say, with some confidence, that the 
great principle of evolution not only prevents our 
being content to think that for man death ends all, 
but encourages the hope that beyond the purview of 
science there are possibilities of a further post- 
mortem existence, as much nobler than the human 
present as humanity itself is than the lower evolu- 
tionary stages through which it has already passed. 
9. At the same time it is by no means irrelevant 
or unworthy that some regard should be paid to 
certain apparent proofs that, at all events, death is 
not the end of the individual existence. The case is 
well put, with an admixture of caution and candour, 
by Dr. McTaggart : — 

"Now the death of the body is by far the 
strongest reason that we have for doubting the 
self's immortality. And if the appearance of 
ghosts could prove that this reason had no 
weight, they would have removed the greatest 
difficulty in the way of the belief. Much of the 



IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 213 

evidence offered on this subject is doubtless 
utterly untrustworthy. But there is a good 
deal which investigation has failed to break 
down. And there is much to be said in support 
of the view that after all deductions have been 
made for fraud, error, and coincidence, there is 
still a sufficient residuum to justify the belief that 
such apparitions are in some cases due to the 
action of the dead man whose body they re- 
present." 1 

From such a quarter this verdict is so significant, 
that it may well be taken as the minimum which is con- 
sistent with the facts, when they are fairly scrutinized. 

10. But inasmuch as the same writer still hesi- 
tates to accept the evidence, and only ventures upon 
the hope that " investigation may give us more 
evidence incompatible with any theory except that 
of survival," it would seem that the time has come 
definitely to claim that such evidence is now forth- 
coming, on the ground of the thorough, patient, 
persistent, investigations of the Society for Psychical 
Research, during the last twenty years. Inasmuch 
as such testimony is yet open to hasty and super- 
ficial, if not contemptuous, dismissal by those who 
have never looked into it, the following deliberate 
utterances from those who have, may be of service to 
the truth. Sir Oliver Lodge, after modestly expres- 
sing a truly scientific experience thus — 

" It so happens that I have been engaged for 
over forty years in mathematical and physical 
science, and for more than half that period in 
exploration into unusual psychical development 
as opportunity arose ; and I have thus been led 
to certain tentative conclusions respecting per- 
missible ways of regarding the universe " — 

1 " Some Dogmas of Religion," p. 106. 



214 IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 

gives his deliberate judgement, as already quoted 
above, 1 

" I have at length, quite gradually, become con- 
vinced, after more than twenty years of study, 
not only that persistent individual existence is 
a fact, but that occasional communication across 
the chasm — with difficulty and under definite 
conditions — is possible." 

If any better qualified expert, in such studies could 
be found, possibly it might be Dr. Hodgson, well- 
known for his exposure of the Blavatsky frauds in 
India. Yet Prof. Barrett tells us concerning him 
that— 

" Dr. Hodgson began his investigation of 
Mrs. Piper's trance utterances as a thorough 
sceptic. But after many years of unremitting 
and critical investigation, testing one hypothesis 
after another, he was finally driven to the con- 
clusion that the chief communicators are verit- 
ably the personalities they claim to be, and that 
they have survived the change which we call 
death. Dr. Hodgson's opinion, it may be added, 
is now shared by many other able inquirers who 
have made a searching and impartial investiga- 
tion of the evidence which has accumulated since 
his death." 2 

Other witnesses, however, might be called, of such 
character and in such abundance 3 that it is not too 

1 See p. 122. 

2 " Psychical Research," by W. F. Barrett, F.R.S. (Williams and 
Norgate). This little volume is an admirable summary which merits 
the attention of every earnest thinker. 

3 The literature of the subject is indeed immense, but it may suffice 
here to mention two only in addition to the above, viz. " Is Death 
the End ? " by a well-known writer who preserves his anonymity 
(F. Griffiths) and " New Light on Immortality," by E. Fournier 
d'Albe (Longmans). In regard to such works nothing is easier than 



IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 215 

much to say, with all Sir Oliver's caution and de- 
liberation, that Dr. McTaggart's caveat has been 
met, and " evidence incompatible with any theory 
except that of survival," is indubitably to hand. In 
one plain word, materialism, including "thanatism," 
is for ever exploded by fact. Death is proved, at the 
very least, not to be the end of all for human beings. 

What has science or philosophy to say against 
human immortality? 

1. Dr. McTaggart remarks truly that the strongest 
reason for questioning the immortality of the self, 
is the death of the body. This is the difficulty 
which has to be frankly faced. As he points out, 
there are three questions to be answered, (i) Is 
my present self an activity of my body ? (ii) Is my 
present body an essential condition of the existence 
of myself? (iii) Is there any reason for thinking 
that my self does not share the transitory character 
of the material phenomena around me ? 

Elaborate discussion will be found elsewhere in 
justification of the plain replies which must sum- 
marily, though truthfully, here be given to these 
crucial questions. As to the first ; my self is not an 
activity of my body. In regard to the second ; all 
that the facts of the case support is, that " while the 
self has or dwells in a body, that body is essentially 

for the orthodox reviewer (as in the "British Weekly ") to write : " Non 
tali auxilio, the Christian believer may say, as he reads. His faith 
in eternal life and glory will find allies, let us hope, in another en- 
vironment than that of extinguished gas and blue magnesium lights." 
But such a sneer is as unworthy as it is ignorantly unfair. On such 
lines, Christianity would never have even begun to be. To all such 
reviewers any fair-minded student may commend the example of the 
Bereans, and the Apostolic maxim — " whatsoever things are true, 
take them all into account ". Psychical research is no more a mere 
matter of " blue magnesium lights," than Christianity is a concoction 
of ecclesiastical miracles. 



216 IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 

connected with the self s mental life ". As to the 
third ; the difference between the self and the matter 
with which it is connected, whether more or less 
intimately, is so great as to preclude all analogy, 
let alone comparison. In such a case, the material 
and the immaterial are incommensurable, and no 
conclusion from the transitoriness of the former can 
be drawn to that of the latter. 

2. There need be no hesitation, therefore, in dis- 
missing as unworthy of regard, the confident dogmat- 
isms of the Haeckelian school, of which the following 
are typical specimens : — 

"The belief in the immortality of the human 
soul is a dogma which is in hopeless contradic- 
tion with the most solid empirical truths of 
modern science. . . . We have to say the same of 
athanatism as of theism, both are creations of 
poetic mysticism and of transcendental faith, not 
of rational science. 1 . . . Modern psychology, phy- 
siology, ontogeny, phylogeny rigorously refuse 
an inch of ground for athanatism. Modern 
science has not taught us a single fact that 
points to the existence of an immaterial world. 
. . . Comparative anatomy and physiology have 
shown that the mind of man is a function of 
the brain and his will is not free, and that his 
soul, absolutely bound up with its material organ, 
passes away at death like the souls of other mam- 
mals. All that comes within the range of our 
knowledge, is a part of the material world." 2 

All these bold assertions are demonstrably false. 3 
They would not indeed be worth quoting for denial, 
were it not for the fact that their dogmatic reiteration 

1 " Riddle of the Universe," cheap edition, pp. 72, 75. 

2 " Wonders of Life," pp. 1 13, 454. 

3 See for reasons, my " Haeckel's Monism False," ch. vi. 



IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 217 

still gives them vogue amongst a large number of 
people in our midst, who, not knowing better, accept 
strong assertion as argument. " Modern Science " 
teaches nothing of the kind. 

3. The strongest apparent argument that material- 
istic science can bring against the post-mortem per- 
sistence of the self, is, that " throughout the animal 
kingdom we never see sensation, perception, instinct, 
volition, reasoning, or any of the phenomena which 
we distinguish as mental, manifested, except in con- 
nexion with nerve matter arranged in systems of 
various degrees of complexity ". 1 It is true. But 
what does it all amount to, when soberly considered ? 
Again in Mr. Fiske's words, "Nothing. Absolutely 
nothing. It not only fails to disprove the validity 
of the belief, but it does not raise even the slightest 
prima facie presumption against it." At most it can 
only apply to the present, whereas it is the future 
with which we are herein concerned. But even that 
cannot now be conceded. For telepathy has defin- 

1 When Haeckel's eager translator asserts in this case that " there 
is exact correspondence between brain action and soul life " 
(" Haeckel's Critics Answered," p. 63) he manifestly concedes the ab- 
solute distinction between the two. " Soul life " is thus a reality in 
itself, for there can only be " correspondence " between entities. 
The dissolution of one of these is no proof whatever of the destruc- 
tion of the other. But how hardly pressed such advocates are, may 
be gathered from what follows : " This correspondence is the same 
as we find in the case of the heart and its function, the stomach 
and digestion, or the lungs and respiration ". For full exposition of 
this hackneyed fallacy, see Dr. Stout's " Manual of Psychology," 
chap. in. But the merest tyro can see the falsity of the suggested 
analogy. Heart and lungs produce motion, stomach manufactures 
digested food ; therefore brain manufactures consciousness, thought, 
emotion, will ! Of a truth Mr. Fiske may well say that " the 
materialistic assumption that there is no thought and feeling in the 
absence of a cerebrum, and that the life of the soul accordingly ends 
with the life of the body, is perhaps the most colossal assumption 
known to the history of philosophy ". 



218 IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 

itely shown that it is not always true, even for the 
present. 

4. But, say some — as if it were so relevant as to 
be conclusive — "When does the immortal soul of 
the individual come into existence ? " The query 
is really so irrelevant as to be not worth answering. 
The fact that no physiology or psychology can en- 
able us to fix a momentary birth for the individual 
self or soul, no more affects its after-death persist- 
ence, than the corresponding fact that no moment 
can be specified as the beginning of self-consciousness, 
lessens the actuality of my knowledge at this moment 
that I am I. 

5. But we are further assured that the " corre- 
spondence between brain action and soul life is just 
the same in man as in the ape or the dog ". If the 
self in man is undying, why not also in all animals ? 
The answer may be plain and direct. The statement 
that "soul life " in man and beast is "just the same," 
is false. It is nothing of the kind. Prof. Haeckel's 
suggestion that any one who keeps a fine dog "will 
have to admit that it has just as valid a claim to im- 
mortality as man himself," is so utterly contrary to 
fact, that any one who will may be called upon to 
try the experiment. 1 The more thoroughly it is done, 
the more immeasurable becomes the difference. Mr. 
Fiske's strong summary is the truth : — 

"It is not too much to say that the difference 
between man and all other living creatures, in 
respect of teachableness, progressiveness, and 
individuality of character, surpasses all other 
differences of kind that are known to exist in 
the universe." 2 

1 As I have done for many years. 

2 " Man's Destiny," p. 57. The whole little book should be read 
by way of appreciating this estimate. 



IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 219 

When, therefore, it is affirmed that "if belief in im- 
mortality is to be anything more than a despairing 
trust, it must appeal to the presence in man of some 
unique power and promise," 1 the challenge may be 
most unhesitatingly taken up. For if there be one 
thing which, next to our own consciousness, is in- 
dubitable, certainly it is that, so far as we know 
anything about the universe, man is inexpressibly 
and unapproachably unique, alike in power and in 
promise, throughout the whole realm of nature. 

6. In spite of all arguments, however, says Dr. 
McTaggart, the idea that the self cannot be immortal, 
continually returns to us. May be. " Yet," he adds, 
" I think that reasons for the belief in immortality 
may be found, of such strength that they should pre- 
vail over all difficulties." A thoughtful mind will 
echo this conclusion all the more earnestly for re- 
membering how difficult it would have been a century 
ago to believe in some things which now no one can 
deny. Had it been told to Nelson, for instance, that 
he might in case of need summon to his side ships 
from across the ocean by wireless message from his 
masthead, it would have seemed an idle tale in very 
deed. " Monstrous," " absurd," " impossible," would 
not have been deemed too strong epithets to employ. 
Some years later, when railways were initiated, it 
was proclaimed impossible that any locomotive could 
ever safely draw a train at twenty miles an hour. 
What has happened since then? Overwhelmingly 
enough, in all realms of modern knowledge, to prove 
that " Believing where we cannot prove " is often 
much more than trustful poetry ; it is valid science. 2 

What, then, is the resultant conviction from the 

1 " HaeckeFs Critics Answered," p. 61. 

2 " Some Dogmas, etc.," pp. no, 11 1. 



220 IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 

pros and cons of science and philosophy in regard to 
human immortality ? 

It is useful sometimes to summarize a position in 
plain statement, leaving for other occasions the usual 
buttressing of assertion with argument. So here, 
with a full sense of responsibility, the following 
affirmations may be made in the fiercest light of our 
present-day knowledge. 

(i) The oracular omniscience which characterizes 
some of the opposition to a belief in immortality, 
may be dismissed without hesitation as irrational. 
When we are told that — 

" The world has grown into a universe to-day, 
and from end to end of it comes only the whisper 
of death. Man now sees in the universe at large 
no shadow of support for that promise of un- 
ending life he has entertained so long " — 1 

it is almost impossible in courteous language to char- 
acterize faithfully such audacious rhodomontade. It 
is simply untrue, and there we may leave it. 

(2) As in all other matters, so here, " our know- 
ledge is a drop, our ignorance a sea ". Says Mr. R. B. 
Arnold, " A being small enough to swim up the blood 
vessels of our brains, could never have the faintest 
conception that the atomic activities around him, 
when totalized, are mind ". In very deed he could 
not; because no number or quantity of " atomic 
activities" ever yet made " mind "when added to- 
gether. Nor ever will. But the infinitesimal being 
here supposed, would only be on a par with our 
modern iconoclast, if he roundly declared that " from 
end to end " of the vascular system around him, 
came only the whisper of mindlessness. 

(3) Ignorance of method, or detail, as to a future 
after death, can never be a final barrier to belief, 

1 " HaeckePs Critics Answered," p. 61. 



IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 221 

because it applies equally to present experience 
which cannot be denied. Mr. Herbert Spencer 
truly said "You cannot take up any problem in 
physics without being quickly led to some metaphy- 
sical problem which you can neither solve nor 
evade ". 

(4) But some things we do know. We know that 
thought is not a function of brain. It is indeed an 
accomplished expert who tells us that the more we 
study the anatomy of the brain cortex, the less we 
can believe that its cells have anything to do with 
the mental processes, beyond serving as agents of 
transmission. 1 The dogmatic assertion, therefore, 
that the life of the soul ends with the body, when 
no known physical connexion whatever exists be- 
tween them, is but an unwarranted and intolerable 
assumption. 

(5) Whilst it is true that the accepted theory of 
psycho-physical parallelism does not prove the con- 
tinuity of the self's existence after death, it does at 
least insist that the door of possibility shall be left 
open. It takes away the only objection to belief in 
such continuity which could be fatal and final. 

(6) From the standpoint of evolution, "there is 
no more philosophical difficulty in man's acquiring 
immortal life, than in his acquiring the erect posture 
or the faculty of articulate speech ". 2 

(7) Endlessness of existence no more needs proof 
than admits of it. What may be in store for the 
human self beyond death, or what may then threaten 
its continuity, we cannot conceive. All we know is 
that death seems to put an end to human individu- 
ality. The question of questions for us is whether 
such seeming amounts to reality. 

1 Dr. Alexander Hill, late Master of Downing College, Cambridge. 

2 Mr. J. Fiske, " Life Everlasting," p. 85. 



222 IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 

(8) It is not too soon, nor too much, to claim that 
that question is answered, as above indicated. The 
evidence of direct psychical research, herein, is at 
once valuable and sufficient. Enough has been 
demonstrated to give the coup de grace to material- 
ism, and put an end to its blatant dogmatism for 
evermore. Telepathy is a fact. As such, it blows 
to the moons of Jupiter the tyrannic fallacies which 
have appeared to block the way to any hope for the 
hereafter. Plain fact, no less than physiological 
psychology, shows that the brain is not the mind, 1 
and thought is not the automatic " function of the 
phronema ". 2 

(9) In a word, " athanatism " is proved by facts. 
But athanatism is not enough to satisfy the human 
mind or heart. As Prof. Barrett well says in his 
admirable summary of the results of psychical re- 
search : — 

" But does the evidence afford us proof of 
immortality ? Obviously it cannot ; nor can 
any investigations yield scientific proof of that 
larger, higher and enduring life which we de- 
sire and mean by immortality. Our own 
limitations, in fact, make it impossible for the 
evidence to convey the assurance that we are 
communicating with what is best and noblest 
in those who have passed into the unseen." 3 

(10) It is something, however, and a very great 
and valuable something, to find that modern science 
does not forbid our listening for other voices that 
may speak more clearly and fully to our hearts. 
It not only imposes no veto upon our longing for 
reunion with those that have gone before, and has 

1 As " Not Guilty," by Mr. R. Blatchford, affirms, p. 95. 

2 As asserted by Prof. Haeckel, and his translator. 

3 pp. 245, 246; 



IS THERE ANY HEREAFTER? 223 

nothing to say against our normal shrinking from 
annihilation, but it dismisses as unwarrantable and 
pessimistic conceit, all talk about only "a whisper 
of death " coming "from end to end of the universe ". 
It unmistakably holds open the door of hope to 
other and more enheartening possibilities. The 
poet's protest is thus amply justified : — 

My own dim life shall teach me this, 

That life shall live for evermore. 

Else earth is darkness at the core, 
And dust and ashes all that is. 



WHAT IS THE CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE OF 
IMMORTALITY? 



*5 



" Our conception of immortality has filtered down to us through the 
dark ages. It is still tainted by their narrowness of outlook, their lack of 
scientific knowledge, their opposition of the natural to the supernatural, 
and we can hardly be surprised that it fails to satisfy or to attract a genera- 
tion before which such amazing vistas of the universe have opened out. 

" Mark has it 'to be cast into hell where their worm dieth not '. True ; 
at the same time it is wholly misleading, and even absurd, to take such 
sayings of our Lord as these and presume to define their meaning apart 
from His whole revelation. We cannot understand the significance of 
any part of Christ's teaching, if we isolate it." — E. Marie Caillard. 

" Nearly all the ' higher ' views of future existence assume a much 
greater effect of Divine ruling in the next world than in this. God is 
more visible, more approachable, more supreme there than here. For 
this, again, we have no warrant of any kind. A world outside of God is 
unthinkable. It would simply be another God, and there is no room for 
two universal centres in a thinkable universe." 

— E. Fournier d'Albe, " New Light on Immortality". 

"The Bible does not teach expressly the natural i immortality of the 
soul in the sense in which 'philosophers have sought to demonstrate it, 
but neither does it teach that only those who believe in Christ survive 
death. There is solemn warning to the wicked of a penalty which awaits 
them in the future life. The view of man which is distinctive of Chris- 
tianity, the worth which it assigns to him, the solicitude on his behalf 
which it ascribes to God, all suggest that even in the sinner death does 
not end all, but that the moral and religious development here begun is 
completed in the hereafter." — Dr. Garvie, " Christian Life and Belief". 

" Since departing souls are carrying evil into the unseen world, we 
cannot fail to see that in that world the question of God's victory over 
evil must be wrought out. God changes never. In that unseen realm of 
life He is the same as here ; or rather in this little world He is the same 
that He for ever is in the infinite realm of being — the lover of souls and 
the hater of sin." 

—Dr. W. N. Clarke, " The Christian Doctrine of God ". 

" Hymns are responsible for a great deal of our foolish ideas on religion. 
Those who undertake work in this department should strive to make our 
hymnody a little more sensible, and a little more poetic. 

" Now what has brought about this foolish idea of death as a long 
sleep until a far-off resurrection day ? Chiefly two things. First, an 
unthinking interpretation of the word ' sleep ' as applied to death by our 
Lord ; and secondly, the idea of a far-off day of judgement — a great world 
assize. The idea is quite unthinkable. 

" To be quite fair, it must be sorrowfully admitted that Protestantism 
has presented pictures of Hell, not perhaps so awful in a material sense, 
but with that exception as awful as those of Rome. The marvel is that 
Christianity should have survived such cruel and awful misrepresentations. 
But they have made its progress in the world immensely slower, and what 
is still worse, they have to multitudes shadowed the fair face of a God de- 
clared by His Son to be love itself." 

— W. Garrett Horder, " The Other World ". 



227 



CHAPTER VIII 

WHAT IS THE CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE OF 
IMMORTALITY? 

It is well indeed that the sweeping dogmatisms of 
materialism should be rebuked by modern science, 
and it is gain for evermore if valid evidence is to 
hand — no matter whence — that the dead are not 
lost, but only gone before. But the craving of the 
human mind and heart is so natural and so insistent 
for further knowledge on this great theme, that when 
science and philosophy have had their say, religion 
also may well be called upon for its verdict. In 
general, it may be assumed that religion is pledged to 
immortality. For whilst Islam is as uncompromis- 
ing as sensuous in its post-mortem promise, Bud- 
dhism strenuously insists that its Nirvana is not 
annihilation, and Hinduism is quite content with its 
transmigrations, in which attitude it is vividly fol- 
lowed by modern Theosophy. We shall, however, 
concern ourselves here only with the Christian 
religion, as being, at least nominally, that of the 
Western world. Considerable stress has been laid in 
the preceding section — probably more than those 
who have not studied the subject will appreciate — 
on the ultimate findings of the Society for Psychical 
Research. But it is equally important not to over- 
rate, any more than underrate, its witness. Prof. 
Barrett's conclusion to his useful summary already 
mentioned, is at once true and suggestive : — 

" In fine, psychical research, though it may 
strengthen the foundations cannot take the place 



228 WHAT IS THE CHRISTIAN 

of religion, using in its widest sense that much- 
abused word. For, after all, it deals with the 
external, though it be in an unseen world ; and 
its chief value lies in the fulfilment of its work 
whereby it reveals to us the inadequacy of the 
external, either here or hereafter, to satisfy the 
life of the soul. The physical order is not the 
spiritual order, but a stepping stone in the ascent 
of the soul to its own self-apprehension, its con- 
scious sharing in the eternal Divine life." 

So that we may come back once more to the truth 
that God, freedom, and immortality are inseparable, 
and ask afresh what is the bearing of the two former 
upon the latter ? 

i. From the Christian standpoint unquestionably, 
both theism and moral responsibility are, as has been 
stated, postulates. How definitely these point on 
to a life to come, needs no labour of words to show. 
The most remarkable position in modern philosophy 
was undoubtedly that of Kant, who did not shrink 
from basing his argument for the very being of God 
upon the assumption that immortality was an inevit- 
able postulate of the pure practical reason. To him 
the summiim bonitm of human life was the complete 
accordance of the mind with the perfect moral law. 
This, however, implied an eternal progression which 
could only be possible in a literal eternity. But the 
necessary condition of the possibility of such an 
eternal progression is the existence of an adequate 
cause, i.e. of God. It is easier to disregard this 
argument than to disprove it ; but we are here only 
concerned to mark well the inseparability of the 
three great factors which constitute the very essence 
of Christianity. 

2. For theism, as a genuine necessity of thought, 
no apology need be offered. Such superficial dog- 
matisms as that of Prof. Haeckel, that "an unpre- 



DOCTRINE OF IMMORTALITY? 229 

judiced study of natural phenomena reveals the 
futility of the theistic idea " ; and of his English re- 
presentative, that "God has now shrunk into an 
intangible cosmic principle," may be as lightly 
dismissed as they are assuredly unwarranted. It 
will suffice to say with Mr. A. J. Balfour : — 

"The ordered system of phenomena asks for 
a cause. Our knowledge of that system is 
inexplicable unless we assume for it a rational 
Author. Under this head, at least, there should 
be no conflict between science and religion." 

Accepting, as now we must, evolution as the Divine 
method of creation, its bearing upon the question of 
immortality is manifest and impressive. 

The wider teleology which it involves means, as 
Huxley so plainly pointed out, not less but more of 
design on the part of the Creator, and warrants our 
utmost appreciation of it. But in so doing it becomes 
unquestionable that the explanation of the beginning 
is in the end ; just as surely as an architect's plans 
are explained and justified by the noble edifice which 
results from following them. So is man the explan- 
ation of protoplasm, not protoplasm of man. If, then, 
man, as the veritable incarnation and embodiment 
of the great Creator's intention, ends absolutely in 
nothing, not only is the impersonal process of 
evolution a self-contradictory enigma, but the sublime 
Personal Author of the age-long process is made to 
act with a futility which, amongst men, would only 
be attributed to an imbecile. Hence Mr. Fiske says 
truly, from the standpoint of theism : — 

" He who regards man as the consummate 
fruition of creative energy, and the chief object 
of Divine care, is almost irresistibly driven to 
the belief that the soul's career is not completed 
with the present life upon the earth. For my 



230 WHAT IS THE CHRISTIAN 

own part, therefore, I believe in the immortality 
of the soul, not in the sense in which I accept 
the demonstrable truths of science, but as a 
supreme act of faith in the reasonableness of 
God's work." 1 

Well, therefore, does the same author ask — "Are 
we to regard the Creator's work as like that of a 
child who builds houses out of blocks, just for the 
pleasure of knocking them down ? " Surely the 
conception of Mephistopheles, as told to Faust, is too 
ghastly to be true : — 

" And man gave God thanks for the strength 
that had enabled him to forego even the joys 
that were possible. And God smiled ; and 
when he saw that man had become perfect in 
renunciation and worship, he sent another sun 
through the sky which crashed into man's sun 
and all returned again to nebula. 'Yes,' God 
murmured, ' it was a good play ; I will have it 
performed again.' " 

Rather must we fall back upon the witness of an 
Agnostic as candid as Huxley, who in his " Life and 
Letters," definitely declares — 

" I am no optimist, but I have the firmest 
belief that the Divine government (if we may 
use such a phrase to express the sum of the 
customs of matter) is wholly just. The absolute 
justice of the system of things is as clear to me 
as any scientific fact." 2 

It cannot be other than just to fulfil a Divinely im- 
planted expectation. It would be more than unjust 
to cause such a development of humanity as must 
lead to desires, affections, longings, more deep and 

1 " The Destiny of Man," pp. 1 1 1, 1 16. 

2 "Life and Letters," vol. I, p. 236. 



DOCTRINE OF IMMORTALITY? 231 

strong and high and tender than any preceding 
animal could ever share, only to consummate them 
with annihilation. As Emerson said : — 

"The Creator keeps His word with us all. 
What I have seen teaches me to trust the 
Creator for what I have not seen. Will you, 
with vast pains and care, educate your children 
to produce a masterpiece, and then shoot them 
down ? " 

3. Certainly this reference to the relation of 
parent and child is entirely warranted from the 
Christian standpoint. Christian theism unmistak- 
ably involves the reality of the Divine and universal 
Fatherhood. The only possible objection to this is 
that it is too good to be true. Assuming that this 
has been sufficiently considered in the preceding 
sections, if God be, as Christian theism asserts, a 
Heavenly Father, it is simply impossible for us to 
think of Him as content to watch an eternal funeral — 
the passing into nothingness of untold generations of 
His children. If man here is a worthy object of love 
Divine, his annihilation by the law of a God of love 
is inconceivable. If the eternal purpose of the Father 
has through measureless ages brought to pass his 
creation, his total destruction by death could not but 
be a frustration and contradiction of that purpose 
such as no earthly father would tolerate. When a 
human father brings up a child with ceaseless love and 
pains from babyhood to manhood or womanhood, and 
then disease or accident ends the promising career, 
it is universally regarded as a calamity which is only 
tolerable because resistless. If God be God, and 
also in any sense a Father, we cannot think of Him 
as either unwilling or unable to prevent such irre- 
parable loss on the larger scale. 

4. But more than that. From our human stand- 



232 WHAT IS THE CHRISTIAN 

point, no less than from the Divine, if the Father- 
hood of God be anything more than a pious and 
pitiful fiction, there must be some other sphere than 
this present life for the manifestation not merely of 
the justice but of the loving sympathy which are 
inseparable from fatherhood. Beyond question the 
greatest difficulty to many thoughtful and sincere 
minds, in regard to the Christian doctrine of Divine 
Fatherhood, is found in the gross inequalities between 
the capacities and opportunities, the joys and sorrows, 
the luxury and penury, the unmerited happiness or 
unhappiness of human beings. Unless a man can 
satisfy his mind with the muddled shifts of " rein- 
carnation," as urged by Theosophy, he is bound to 
ask that somehow, somewhere, in some way, a more 
fair and impartial scheme of things shall be inaugur- 
ated. The story of Dives and Lazarus may be but 
metaphorical, none the less it involves such eternal 
principles of justice and sympathy as cannot possibly 
be ignored, if any Divine government, let alone 
Fatherhood, is to be maintained. " Son, remember 
that thou in thy lifetime receivedst thy good things 
and likewise Lazarus evil things. But now, here, 
he is being comforted, and thou art in anguish." 
What they deserve who in this life have had every 
boon it can offer, and squandered it all in brutal self- 
ishness, may be beyond our judgement. But our 
hearts refuse to be silenced when we cry out against 
the undeserved pangs of myriads of helpless sufferers 
who, through no fault of their own, have been 
" damned into the world " to start with, and thence- 
forward have never had a chance to make life, in 
any noble human sense, worth living. That there 
are myriads such, even in modern civilization, can- 
not, alas ! be questioned. 

If a mere mindless energy, working through chance 
or blind "necessity," rules the universe — well, there 



DOCTRINE OF IMMORTALITY? 233 

is no more to be said. Confusion is only what 
might be expected. But Divine Fatherhood cannot 
contemplate such a moral chaos with indifference. 
Whatever becomes of our theologies, or our conven- 
tions, these unfortunates must all have their share 
in good — if not here, then hereafter. They cannot 
be permitted by a God whose "love is as great as 
His power," to be born with human capacities for 
enjoyment no less than for suffering, only to endure 
anguish and then cease to be. Such blighted human 
beings would be blots for ever upon the love of God, if 
there were no other existence in which the compen- 
sation provided for Lazarus came also to every 
innocent sufferer. Such assured compensation 
hereafter is, indeed, no excuse whatever for moral 
laissez-faire here and now. Nor does it involve any 
warrant whatever for diminishing our present efforts 
towards justice and sympathy to the uttermost. 
But when these fail through no fault of ours, it is 
unspeakable comfort to know that all is not over. 
Those whom we would have helped and could not, 
have not plunged headforemost into the " vacant jaws 
of darkness," but have gone to "Abraham's bosom ". 
Such a figure may be taken to signify at least a 
blended fatherhood and motherhood more tender 
and sufficing than any known here on earth. 

5. Yet another call upon the Divine Fatherhood 
must be made, so long as its reality is assumed. It 
must have some relation to the unnumbered hosts of 
the deaths which we cannot but call "premature," 
whether they occur in childhood or adolescence. We 
have seen how Prof. Haeckel waxes very bitter here ; l 
and certainly, if this little life were indeed demon- 
strated to be all, the suggested Nemesis of faith would 
be difficult to avoid. But the writer wilfully forgets 

1 See p. 49. 



234 WHAT IS THE CHRISTIAN 

that the faith at which he sneers, which dares to 
speak of a Heavenly Father here, insists just as 
plainly and earnestly that this life is not the only 
sphere of His operation. There is thus no fairness 
in the indictment which separates the two realms, and 
utterly ignores the greater. Christian belief does 
not, cannot, profess to find the full manifestation of 
the Divine Fatherhood in this present stage of being. 
Christ's own words are homely indeed, but they are 
as unmistakable as unfathomable when justice is 
done them. 

Alas ! that a figure of speech marred by archaic 
English still minifies and stultifies, for very many, 
the surest and tenderest word of comfort ever 
spoken to sorrowing human hearts : — 

11 Let not your heart be troubled ! Trust in 
God ; trust also in Me. In My Father's house 
are many resting-places. If it were not so I 
would have told you." 

How long religious obscurantism will cling to the 
now utterly misleading word " mansions," as in the 
version of 1611 — wrongly called ''Authorized" — no 
one can say. But the hindrance of it is immeasur- 
able, just where the modern mind and heart most 
need sane suggestions of genuine comfort. As- 
suredly there is no such comfort as the Christian 
mind craves, in the suggestion of an endless series of 
11 mansions " — considering the present-day signifi- 
cance of that term. What the heart cries out for is 
restored communion, perpetuation of love, continua- 
tion of unselfish service — all of which legitimately 
come into the assurance of Jesus, but are blocked 
out of thought by the repellent archaism to which so 
many }^et appear to be devoutly attached. 

We do not need the gibes of unbelief to remind 
us of the heart-breaking mysteries of those deaths 



DOCTRINE OF IMMORTALITY? 23$ 

where everything worth considering calls for more, 
many more, of such human lives as are thus ended. 
Here is one typical case, taken from a journal issued 
whilst these pages are being written. 

"A terribly tragic occurrence took place at Old 
Trafford on the 10th of November. On the 
bridge which crosses the Ship Canal, Dr. W. P. 
Marshall and his wife were walking at the same 
time that a large motor wagon was crossing. 
Dr. Marshall stopped for a moment to notice 
something passing in the canal below, and at 
that moment the wagon, by reason of the greasy 
condition of the roadway, skidded and pinned 
the doctor against the side of the bridge. His 
injuries were so terrible that he died at Salford 
Hospital on Monday last. The deceased was 
the son of Rev. Dr. Marshall, Principal of the 
Baptist College, Manchester, and six months 
ago married Miss E. Marshall of Bolton. The 
latter belongs to one of the oldest and most 
respected families of the Bridge Street Circuit, 
and has been brought up at Fletcher Street 
Chapel." 

Before such a tragedy of grief and loss, our hearts 
stand appalled, and words are useless. It is small 
comfort in very deed, to know of many other in- 
stances of equal mystery and sorrow. Their name 
is legion. 

Never morning wore 
To evening, but some heart did break. 

Whether we think of such inexplicable tragedies 
as the foregoing, or the even more pathetic deaths of 
myriads of loved little ones, it is simply impossible 
to believe in the love of a heavenly Father for us 
His children, if all these, younger or older, who 
have been the very embodiments of all that is 



236 WHAT IS THE CHRISTIAN 

Divinest in human nature, are but to pass as worth- 
less trifles into the everlasting dark. If we too, 
following them with hearts over-charged, sharing 
the grief that can only spring from love, have no 
prospect but to be pushed on in turn into oblivion, 
then not only were it better not to be, but the 
despair of unbelief which regards the Divine Father- 
hood as but " the baseless shadow of a wistful human 
dream," would be justified. If God be our Father, 
death cannot be the destruction of our loved ones, nor 
the charnel-house of all our tenderest, noblest hopes. 

6. It will not be of avail here to refer to the testi- 
mony of the Bible generally, for the double reason 
that (i) it could only be authoritative for those who 
accept its inspiration ; and that (ii) the Old Testament 
throws but little light, and that only uncertainly, 
upon any life beyond the grave. In the earlier 
periods of Jewish history, as reflected in our Canon, 
there was no conception of or reference to eternity 
at all. A dim hope that it was well with the right- 
eous, and ill with the wicked, in a shadow-land 
that was called Sheol, was almost all. True, in 
some of the Psalms there are hints of brighter hopes. 
Whether these can be traced back to Persian, or 
Egyptian, or Accadian influences, is irrelevant. Be- 
fore the time of the Maccabees, the whole case may 
be truly summed up in the words of Dr. Salmond, 
to the effect that the Old Testament — " caught but 
occasional flashes of the light of an after life ".* In 
the Apocrypha we first meet those more definite 
and larger views and hopes which prepare the way 
for the unmistakable attitude of Christ Himself. 

7. So long as the New Testament is held in 
any regard, its testimony, as embodying that of 
Christ and His Apostles, is unequivocal and final. 

1 For an excellent summary of the case, see Book Second in his 
" Christian Doctrine of Immortality ". 



DOCTRINE OF IMMORTALITY? 237 

(i) The teaching of Jesus as to the life after death 
is, indeed, neither academic nor theological. But it 
is unquestionably real and unmistakable. No proof 
is offered ; no detail is given ; no curious questions 
are answered. But the actuality of another state of 
being after death, in definite moral continuity with 
this present, is never for a moment left in un- 
certainty. However greatly sections of the Christian 
Church may have differed, or may yet differ, as to 
eschatology, no one of them has ever questioned 
the reality of that after-death continuity of person- 
ality which Jesus everywhere and always assumed. 
For the non-Christian world, of course, such teach- 
ing may not be final ; but all Christendom, assuredly, 
will refuse herein to believe Him to have been either 
deceiver or deceived. 

(ii) His character, moreover, becomes a witness 
in itself. No notice need be taken of the insignifi- 
cant minority, even in the ranks of unbelief, of those 
who have attempted to belittle or besmirch that 
character. He of whom Strauss wrote that "noth- 
ing can be added to the moral intuition which Jesus 
Christ has left us," and concerning whom also Mr. 
John Stuart Mill declared that even an unbeliever 
could not " find a better rule of virtue, than to en- 
deavour so to live that Christ would approve his 
life," will lose nothing in the estimate of all who are 
worth considering, by the occasional gibes of a 
vulgar journalism, or the sneers of some of the 
coarser representatives of Secularism. His character 
remains and will ever remain where Mr. Lecky, the 
eminent "rationalist," put it. 1 

1 The words have been so often quoted as scarcely to need re- 
petition. In briefest statement, lest any reader should have missed 
it : " It was reserved for Christianity to present to the world an ideal 
character, which through all the changes of eighteen centuries, has 
inspired the hearts of men with an impassioned love — has been not 



238 WHAT IS THE CHRISTIAN 

In Him, therefore, the incredibility of a Divinely 
directed but self-frustrated evolution, reaches its 
unanswerable climax. If it be self-contradictory, 
even on naturalistic lines, that evolution as a process 
of the ages should culminate in a creature of man's 
calibre, and then allow him to become extinct ; it is 
far more incredible that God, who is in the fullest 
sense the Father of mankind, should express that 
relationship in an evolutionary purpose which 
finds its highest and noblest end in a Goethe, or a 
Shakespeare, or a Gladstone, or a Kelvin, and then 
suffer these personalities, with all the mystery of 
their unmeasured potency, to be smitten into ex- 
tinction by death. But most of all does it become 
impossible to believe, that He who was in a supreme 
and unique sense " Son of man " and " Son of God," 
the moral and spiritual flower of all the ages, could 
be permitted by a God of wisdom, love, and power, 
to pass out of being as totally and irrevocably as — 
to quote Haeckel's simile — "the fly of a summer's 
day, the microscopic infusorium, or the smallest 
bacillus ". The living Christ is in Himself, now 
and for evermore, the pledge that death is not the 
human terminus. 

(iii) But the yet stronger and final appeal of the 
Christian hope of immortality is to fact. Whether 
the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead was 
a purely " spiritual " event, which left the mangled 
body to moulder in a Syrian grave ; or whether it 
was so far " physical " as to involve a transformation 
from the body of his humiliation into a real and 
glorious though spiritual body, may be left here un- 

only the highest pattern of virtue, but the strongest incentive to its 
practice, and has exercised so deep an influence, that it may be truly 
said that the simple record of three short years of active life, has 
done more to regenerate and soften mankind than all the disquisitions 
of philosophers and all the exhortations of moralists ". 



DOCTRINE OF IMMORTALITY? 239 

decided as irrelevant. The question of questions is 
did Jesus the Crucified, as a matter of fact, pass on 
through death into that larger life which He had 
not only Himself anticipated but definitely promised 
to those about Him, as the crowning proof of the 
truthfulness of His whole mission ? The Christian 
answer is, that He did. The validity of the proofs 
of His reappearing after death, must be discussed 
elsewhere. 1 Here we are warranted in assuming 
the fact, and appreciating the consequence. What 
this greatest of human events has done, and done 
for evermore, is, in Dr. Salmond's words — "It has 
translated a guess, a dream, a longing, a probability, 
into a certainty ". It is no mere religious sentiment, 
but a rational and scientific inference, which is em- 
bodied in Gellert's well-known hymn : — 

Jesus lives — thy terrors now, 
Can, O death, no more appal us ; 
Jesus lives — by this we know, 
Thou, O grave, can'st not enthral us. 

The certainty, which is the final rock of our refuge 
from waves of doubt concerning death's effect, is 
that it was not the end of His personality. No 
more, then, has it been for those who have gone 
before. Nor will it be so for ourselves. By that 
assurance, Christianity stands or falls. 

(iv) All this, i.e. the unhesitating acceptance of 
the unshakable reality and the unmeasured con- 
sequence of the resurrection of Jesus, was unequi- 
vocally endorsed by all the Apostles, and universally 

1 On a theme so important it may be well to mention the follow- 
ing works as being not merely up to date, but sufficient to convince 
all who are open to conviction : "The Resurrection of our Lord," 
Prof. Milligan (Macmillan) ; " Our Lord's Resurrection," W. Sparrow 
Simpson ; also by the same author, " The Resurrection and 
Modern Thought" (both Longmans); "The Resurrection of 
Jesus," Dr. Jas. Orr (Hodder and Stoughton) ; " Studies in the 
Resurrection," C. H. Robinson (Longmans). 



240 WHAT IS THE CHRISTIAN 

accepted as true, by all the earliest as well as later 
Christian believers. There were many heresies 
and divisions in those days, far more than enough 
to exhibit independence of opinion, and guarantee 
utter absence of collusion, as between the Churches. 
But there is no recorded heresy hereupon, because 
there was no other belief. As to the future, there 
was in those days room for doubt and mistake. Con- 
cerning the promised coming of their Lord, the first 
disciples had much to unlearn. But the very eager- 
ness of the belief which led to their mistake, was de- 
rived from the certainty of their conviction that Jesus 
was living, not dead ; that He had conquered death, 
and was alive for evermore. Since that time, even 
until now, believers have gone on meddling with 
the future which Jesus so plainly bade them let 
alone. Prophecies without number have been 
issued, even more false and foolish than those of 
the first century. But the very pity with which 
the instructed Christian or non-Christian dismisses 
them, is a witness to the unbroken continuity and 
unquestioned assurance of the universal Christian 
belief in, and hope from, the actuality of the resur- 
rection of Jesus who was crucified. Not merely, 
therefore, on the authority of His teaching, nor on the 
unimpeachableness of His character, did their hopes 
then rest, but on the certainty, made sure by His 
appearings, that He had passed through death un- 
harmed to fulfil His word — "I go to prepare a place 
for you ". 

Concerning such a hope there has never been, and 
it is quite safe to say that there never will be, any 
division in Christendom. There is no risk in affirm- 
ing that it is the most numerously and deeply held 
religious conviction in the whole history of humanity. 1 

1 As to the often heard loose talk about the numerical superiority 
of Buddhism, which is altogether untrue, see " Haeckel's Monism 



DOCTRINE OF IMMORTALITY? 241 

If, then, this whole belief were but the delusion that 
modern Naturalism would have us think, it would be 
at once the most enormous and most pitiful of all that 
have ever afflicted mankind. But there is no sufficient 
reason for so regarding it. What we know as the 
fifteenth chapter of Paul's first letter to the Cor- 
inthians, remains at once the most unmistakable and 
noble expression of the Christian hope. When all 
that it involves — considering the time and circum- 
stances of its writing — is taken into account, it is 
also a sure pledge of the universal confidence of the 
Christians of the middle of the very first century, 
that they had " not followed cunningly devised 
fables," in believing that Jesus was risen from the 
dead, never more to die. That inspiring conviction, 
all the conflicts of the dark ages never lessened, let 
alone destroyed. The fierce light of our modern 
knowledge, so far from quenching such a belief, or 
extinguishing such a hope, is tending more and more 
to confirm it. Whether we accept, or not, the exact 
statement of the late F. W. H. Myers, he was at least 
an impartial and thorough investigator, who speaks 
for no little modern psychology, quite as truly as 
Eucken or Bergson for latest philosophy. 

" I venture now on a bold saying ; for I pre- 
dict that in consequence of the new evidence, 
all reasonable men a century hence, will believe 
the resurrection of Christ, whereas in default of 
the new evidence, no reasonable man a century 
hence would have believed it." 

One may doubt the latter clause here, without in- 
validating the former. In any case his other sum- 
mary remains true : — 

False," pp. 543-5 ; also "Clarion Fallacies," p. 174. Christianity 
lays no stress upon numbers, but it is time for the truth's sake that 
this misrepresentation ceased. 

16 



242 WHAT IS THE CHRISTIAN 

"On a basis of observed facts, Christianity, 
the youngest of the great types of religion, does 
assuredly rest. Assuredly those facts so far as 
tradition has made them known to us, do tend 
to prove the superhuman character of its 
Founder, and His triumph over death ; and thus 
the existence and influence of a spiritual world 
where men's true citizenship lies. These ideas, 
by common consent, lay at the origin of the 
faith." 1 

8. It may be well now to summarize the es- 
sentials of modern Christian belief, in regard to that 
life after death concerning the reality of which it 
permits no doubt. 

(i) No phase of Christian doctrine needed, or has 
undergone, more recent reform, than that generally 
known as "eschatology ". The change which has 
quietly but unmistakably come to pass during the 
last fifty years, is indeed immeasurable. No amount 
of respect for our forefathers must be allowed to 
prevent our recognizing their mistakes. It is human 
to err, and assuredly theology has no more been 
exempt from that principle than science. It is not 
too much to say — and there are very weighty reasons 
in these days for saying it — that the doctrines which 
were formerly accepted and preached in regard to 
the world to come, illustrated the very worst faults 
of which theology is capable. They were rigidly 
built upon a false rock — the theory of verbal inspira- 
tion ; and were most elaborately constructed upon 
a false principle — the method of exegesis by means 
of isolated proof-texts, picked and used without re- 
gard to context. Hence assertions were made, and 
dogmas formulated, which practically assumed both 
omniscience and infallibility. So that in the name 

1 "Human Personality," Vol. II, pp. 286, 288. 



DOCTRINE OF IMMORTALITY? 243 

of evangelical religion, horrors of ill and unrealities 
of good were not only set before men as the very 
soul of the Gospel of Jesus, but were most positively 
made the very tests of a standing or falling universal 
Church. 

How markedly that note has ceased to be sounded, 
almost every pulpit in the land now bears witness. 
Not even a Spurgeon would be tolerated to-day, if 
he ventured to repeat some of the things in print 
which have appeared with his name attached. 
Traces, indeed, of the same spirit are, not unnatur- 
ally, still to be found. Thus an able and eminent 
theologian writes quite recently, that in thinking and 
teaching concerning the great hereafter — "We have 
no right to go beyond the plain and abundant teach- 
ing of the sacred Book. To do so is perilous in the 
extreme." But this " plain " and "abundant," is 
exactly what, hereupon, " the teaching of the sacred 
Book " is not. It is certainly not plain ; for the very 
writer of these words was thereupon indicted for 
heresy by his own Church. On behalf of what he 
held to be the truth, he set himself directly to face 
and contradict what numbers of men, quite as able 
and sincere, have insisted that the Bible definitely 
teaches. How can the teachings of Scripture be 
deemed "plain," in view of all the differences of 
opinion, " heresies " as they have been termed, which 
devoted and scholarly Christian men have held in 
regard to them ? Nor can they any more truly be 
pronounced "abundant," seeing that in the Old 
Testament there is next to nothing definite ; that 
the Apocrypha speaks only dimly of anything beyond 
the assurance of personal continuity; whilst as to 
the New Testament, when difficult and uncertain 
"passages " are withdrawn, there is really very little 
left to determine any opinion as to those exact de- 
tails upon which former theologies laid such stress. 



244 WHAT IS THE CHRISTIAN 

Hereupon, Dr. Salmond has done well to emphasize 
what has been all too generally ignored : — 

"The Christian doctrine has also made 1 the 
contribution of reserve, where reserve has been 
most needful and most salutary, the contribution 
of silence where the conjectures of men have 
been least restrained and of smallest profit for 
the practical conduct of life." 1 

It has been in the past not merely "perilous," but 
mischievous in the extreme, to write and preach as 
if the whole counsels of eternity had been 'com- 
pressed into a few texts of Scripture and a few 
strong figures of speech. Especially when these 
latter were generally made to be misrepresentations, 
by treating them as literal, and even physical, de- 
lineations. Instead, therefore, of its being a down- 
grade sign of "heterodoxy," the fact that Christian 
teachers now speak with bated breath where their 
predecessors shouted with certainty, and are even 
silent sometimes where formerly men had most to 
say, is one of the surest indications of the apprehen- 
sion of reality. The greater modesty of modern 
belief is a pledge of the deepening, not the enfeebling, 
of conviction. 

(ii) Modern Christian faith in regard to things 
unseen, is increasingly disposed to act upon the 
Apostolic ideal — "Whatsoever things are true" — 
" Prove all things, hold fast that which is good ". 
Whether light comes from science or philosophy, 
from Spiritism or Theosophy, from apparitions or 
telepathy, matters not, so long as it is light. It does 
not follow herefrom that the Christian who takes 
the New Testament as his standard is necessarily 
blind or bigoted, narrow or one-eyed, because he 
does not fall in at once with every modern sugges- 

1 " Christian Doctrine of Immortality, 53 p. 466. 



DOCTRINE OF IMMORTALITY? 245 

tion. The earnestness and sincerity of many en- 
thusiasts for the new cults with which this age is so 
liberally supplied, may be conceded. But such an 
acknowledgment demands a similar concession from 
those to whom it is granted. Because the Christian 
believer in real and blessed immortality does not 
find it possible to accept, say, Dr. McTaggart's 
views upon pre-existence ; or to regard as reasonable 
Mrs. Besant's fourteen " reasons " for reincarnation ; 
or to take en bloc all the alleged instances of " spirit 
manifestations " ; it is not necessarily to be inferred 
that he is lacking either in intelligence or honesty. 
"Let every man," well said the Apostle Paul, "be 
fully convinced in his own mind." All that need 
here be affirmed is that whilst there may be room for 
discussion in each of these three directions, genuine 
Christian faith is independent of any one of them. 
Until Christian theism is shown to be irrational, it 
is not necessary to assume an individual's existence 
without beginning, in order to predicate his continu- 
ance without end. All theories of reincarnation are 
wrecked hopelessly upon the hard fact that there is 
no conscious, and therefore no personal, continuity. 
The confused and incoherent mass of alleged "spirit 
revelations " yield little more of what is reliable, than 
pitchblende does of radium. Even that residue is 
useless for anything more than objective demonstra- 
tion of the simple fact, that death does not end all for 
human beings. 

(iii) Christian belief can never be content either 
with the bare objectivity of actual personal continu- 
ity, such as, on the whole, Sir Oliver Lodge with 
many others now considers demonstrated ; or with 
the ambiguities and puerilities which, for the most 
part, characterize spiritistic " revelations " — to say 
nothing about the undeniable amount of delusion 
and fraud which has accompanied them. On the 



246 WHAT IS THE CHRISTIAN 

other hand, for all purposes of Christian faith, there 
is no real reason or need that Scripture teachings 
should be both "plain and abundant," in the theo- 
logical sense. They are plain enough and abundant 
enough to yield main principles of comfort, hope, 
and duty. With these, in our present state of being, 
we may well be content. Some wise words of Prof. 
Eucken are here most pertinent : — 

" From a too great troubling about the future 
we are, however, especially protected, if we keep 
clearly in view our complete ignorance of its 
character. Kant concludes his critique of the 
practical reason with these words — 'Thus what 
the study of nature and of man teaches us suf- 
ficiently elsewhere may well be true here also, 
that the unsearchable wisdom by which we 
exist is not less worthy of admiration in what 
it has denied than in what it has granted V' 1 

9. When the whole testimony of the New Testa- 
ment, with all that it includes, is taken soberly and 
thoughtfully, we have all that is necessary for the 
development of loftiest personal character, and the 
encouragement of the noblest hopes. The following 
may stand as a suggestive summary. 

(i) Real, conscious, unmistakable, personal con- 
tinuity, is everywhere and always assumed as be- 
yond question. Whatever may inevitably be obscure 
beyond the grave, there is no kind or degree of 
obscurity about the certainty that I shall be I, as 
surely as I am now ; and shall know myself to be 
such as I have been here. This may be more than 
enough for the vicious man, but it is the best of good 
news to every one who here has given his utmost for 
the highest. 

(ii) The retention unchanged, in passing through 

1 " Hibbert Journal," July, 1908, p. 851. 



DOCTRINE OF IMMORTALITY? 247 

death, of the moral character here wrought out, is 
unequivocally asserted. As such, it is at once the 
most solemn warning for the bad, and the most 
potent inspiration for the good. Nothing can exceed 
the bliss or woe of the plain principle — " God is not 
mocked, whatever a man sows, that will he also 
reap " — as applied to the perpetuation of personality, 
when death has done all it can to human beings. 

(iii) Here we know ourselves not only as finite 
spirits, but as inseparably associated with and de- 
pendent on bodies which constitute most real limita- 
tions. The connexion which here so inexplicably 
but resistlessly exists between soul and body, death 
dissolves. No more ; but no less. Such dissolution 
must bring with it freedom from our present limita- 
tions, whatever others may abide. By so much 
therefore, will the life to come be larger than the 
life that now is. That cannot but involve a wider 
scope and larger potency, upward for the worthy, 
downward for the unworthy. Such changes may 
truly be, as Eucken and Kant have hinted, quite 
inexpressible in the thought or speech of earth. 
But that is no argument against their reality. Ac- 
cording to valid moral principles the paradox is true 
that personal continuance cannot be mere continu- 
ance. For the personality necessarily carries with 
it the accumulated result of its present working. 
The momentum of character here developed, is that 
which starts the larger upward or downward growth 
hereafter. 

(iv) Such self-created impulse for higher good, or 
baser ill, will be the true and only " day of judge- 
ment," as asserted in well-known words of the 
New Testament. 1 



1 Say, for instance, the second chapter of Romans, or the fifth 
of Galatians, etc. 



248 WHAT IS THE CHRISTIAN 

The notion of a universal simultaneous assize, 
when all those who have ever dwelt upon this planet 
will be assembled in some incalculably huge mass, is 
as childish and unnecessary as it is utterly inconceiv- 
able when seriously contemplated. It has popularly 
resulted from the unthinking application of two 
vicious principles of interpretation which no adult 
mind can for a moment tolerate. First, the dealing 
with pictures and figures of speech as literal prose ; 
and secondly, the attempt, as futile as well-intended, 
to express timeless spiritual realities in concrete 
terms of the time-measured present. The "day of 
judgement " has no more to do with a specific time- 
limited spectacular convulsion, than the "day of 
trouble" which the Psalmist met with pra}^er; or 
the " day " which was ever on the lips of the prophets 
as the promise of deliverance ; or the " day " of Christ 
which He said Abraham had foreseen. Here, indeed, 
without quotation, we may affirm that the teaching 
of Scripture is plain and abundant ; but its sober and 
sensible, as well as solemn, intimations, have been 
sacrificed to superficial exposition and popular sen- 
sationalism. When these are unlearned, it will be 
seen that there is no need whatever to borrow from 
Buddhism, or any other source, a doctrine of Karma 
which shall embody perfect justice. For the Chris- 
tian law of Karma is quite as real and impressive, 
though not so frigid and ruthless, as all the threaten- 
ings of the East. The Christian hereafter holds no 
"fate" for any man, save that which he here makes 
for himself. And if he goes on to make it more dire 
beyond the grave than here, it will be, according to 
Christ's principles, not because there is no mercy for 
him, but because he will not seek, nor therefore find, 
the mercy that always waits for every man so long 
as God is God. 

(v) More than this, all we are permitted by the 



DOCTRINE OF IMMORTALITY? 249 

combined utterance and silence of the Christian 
Scriptures to hold for true, is the inevitable con- 
sequence of retained moral personality, viz. the 
reality and activity of thought, feeling, will. Such 
retention necessarily includes those powers of choice 
which can never, in the nature of things, be absent 
from a moral being. It also implies all those actual- 
ities of communion which, in regard to loved ones 
gone before, our hearts so strenuously demand. But 
it leaves unanswered most of the questions which so 
irrepressibly spring up in every mind that seriously 
contemplates the future. " Lord, will there be few 
saved?" asked the disciples. But the Master did 
not answer the query. Nor is it answered for us ; 
any more than the cognate questions as to whether 
there will be greater or less opportunities of falling 
or rising ; whether such permanence of evil char- 
acter can here be attained as must make all hope of 
turning to the good unthinkable ; whether in the 
end 

. . . good shall fall 
At last — far off— at last, to all, 

And every winter change to spring. 

All these and kindred queries, however sincerely 
and reverently propounded, belong to the category 
of " unspeakable things " such as Paul may, or may 
not, have distantly seen in the recorded vision 
which he was not permitted to repeat. This only 
we know, that all dogmatism as to the finality of 
human destiny is as unwarranted and unwarrantable 
as it is unnecessary to Christian truth, or love, or 
comfort, or duty. " The Father hath committed all 
judgement to the Son." There we must be content, 
and ought to be more than content, to leave it. 
Whenever theology assumes omniscience, it falsifies 
itself. 

10. A few practical inferences from all the fore- 



250 WHAT IS THE CHRISTIAN 

going seem to be called for. The paradox is true, 
again, that modern Christian faith is growing at 
once more certain and more uncertain. There is, 
in regard to the great hereafter towards which we 
are all helplessly drifting day by day, more certainty 
than ever in all that we really need to know, more 
uncertainty in all that is not necessary. 

(i) The normal, healthy hope that death does not 
end all, that individuality is retained, that moral 
character is not lost, that communion with loved ones 
already gone, is in store for us — these are to-day 
more certain than ever. Modern Agnosticism cannot 
deny them without den}'ing itself, so that its chilly 
aloofness counts for nothing. Those who boast that 
they do not know, should be the last to protest 
against those who affirm that, in an}' degree, they 
do know. For the good man this in itself is enough. 

Glory of virtue, to fight, to struggle, to right the wrong — 
Nay, but she aimed not at glory, no lover of glory she ; 
Give her the glory of going on and still to be. 

She desires no isles of the blest, no quiet seats of the just ; 
To rest in a golden grove, or to bask in a summer sky ; 
Give her the wages of going on, and not to die. 

(ii) The uncertainty as to future judgement, or the 
ultimate fate of each individual, which no theology 
can ever relieve, should make all real Christians 
at once more careful, more charitable, more hopeful, 
as to the vast host of whom they know little or 
nothing. Also, more tenderly earnest towards all 
those who seem to be content with evil, by reason 
of what we know must be the dire results of per- 
sistence in wrong-doing. This is more than suf- 
ficient as motive for the utmost zeal in Christian 
effort, without any thought, let alone reiteration, of 
the harsh and often ghastly threatenings which used 
to be called "Gospel appeals ". 



DOCTRINE OF IMMORTALITY? 251 

(iii) In regard to the bright side of the after-death 
condition — "the state of the blessed dead" as it is 
termed — there is greater need than ever before that 
the Christian hope should be expressed truly and 
worthily, as well as earnestly, whether in sermons, 
hymns, prayers, writings, or elsewhere. At present, 
there is far too often no small opportunity for op- 
ponents to contemn and deride the whole prospect. 
Prof. Tyndall's words have an even greater force 
now than when he uttered them, that — "Theologians 
must liberate and refine their conceptions ; or must 
be prepared for the rejection of them by thoughtful 
minds ". As regards the matter before us, Flugge 
wrote most pertinently that — "Assuredly the Chris- 
tian belief in a future state is capable of and urgently 
needs elevation, if it is to be regarded as anything 
more than a popular mythus, and to possess any 
interest or attraction for cultivated men ". This is, 
one must honestly acknowledge, but a mild putting 
of the case. Alas ! in numberless instances, the 
" Heaven " to come has been but a thoughtless 
agglomeration of sensational childishness, utterly 
intolerable as soon as really contemplated. 

For this lamentable marring of the noble and 
blessed Christian hope, there have been and yet are 
two main sources, (i) the perversion of the New 
Testament ; and (ii) the publication of popular 
hymns. As to the former : language which is mani- 
festly and highly figurative has been taken with a 
crass literalness unworthy of a schoolboy. Especially 
in regard to the portion which happens to come last, 
in our arrangement of the Canon of the Christian 
Scriptures. It is indeed little less than a calamity 
that the book of " Revelation " does come last in the 
New Testament as we have it, so gross and mischiev- 
ous have been the inferences drawn from it. In 
general, its poetry has been treated as prose ; its 



252 WHAT IS THE CHRISTIAN 

figures as concrete physical realities ; its contempo- 
rary references have been twisted into predictions ; 
and the whole interpretation divorced alike from 
sound exegesis and from common sense. This kind 
of treatment has naturally resulted in such a repre- 
sentation of Heaven and Hell, following upon an 
utterly impossible "day of judgement," that it has 
sometimes become difficult to say which prospect is 
the more repulsive, the bright or the dark, to edu- 
cated minds in this century. A ridiculous Heaven, 
and an incredible Hell, have been only too vividly 
and too often proclaimed in the name of the Gospel 
of Jesus. It is high time, indeed, that such double 
travesty ceased. 

But it will not cease until there is a thorough 
purging of the hymns employed in Christian 
services, and found even in some of the best Hymn 
Books. It would be a thankless task to enumerate 
such productions, but it is not too much to say that 
modern Christianity would gain immensely if half of 
the hymns referring to the future life were burnt. 
The other half would then call for careful revision. 
The notion that tender poetry, and expression of 
the deepest, worthiest, longing of the purest hearts, 
must be accompanied b}^ false science, stupid realism, 
and coarse sensationalism, is, mercifully, altogether 
false. Especially is this need of revision true in 
regard to children. When all allowance is made 
for the imaginative age, it is much rather cruelty 
and danger than benediction, to store their memories 
with crude falsities which will later on have to be 
all unlearned, if they are to remain Christian. It is 
in general only a mawkish and morbid pietism which 
multiplies for little ones on life's threshold, hymns 
about d}'ing. Even if there be genuine need for a 
few, in view of the many early deaths, at least these 
should be free from monstrosities which may peril- 



DOCTRINE OF IMMORTALITY? 253 

ously lead astray the vivid imaginations of child- 
hood. 

The supreme and final influence of the truly 
Christian conception of the life to come must be 
practical. The time has happily gone by when it 
was deemed a mark of deep devotion to sing such 
selfish doggerel as sometimes then obtained, e.g. — 

Nothing is worth a thought beneath, 
But how I may escape the death, 

That never never dies ; 
How make my own election sure, 
And when I fail on earth, secure 

A mansion in the skies. 

The good tidings of Jesus for mankind are becoming 
better understood in these days than they have ever 
been before. "The Son of God is come" — said 
John — " and hath given us an understanding. " Those 
who have been taught of Him look for, work for, 
hope for, pray for, a Kingdom of Heaven which is 
equally real on both sides of the grave. The Heaven 
that shall be, can only be a development of the 
Heaven that may be, ought to be, and in some 
measure already is, here and now. Assuredly it 
must be said, in regard to the two Heavens which 
Christ's Gospel contemplates, that he who does not 
appreciate both, does justice to neither. 

The all-embracing, all-comprehensive truth is 
that, whether here or hereafter, Heaven is character, 
and Hell is character. There is no other heaven, 
no other hell, in the universe of God, than the 
development of the character each personality is 
now actually making. Death cannot save the real 
sinner from the consequences of the bad ; cannot rob 
the true saint of the reward of the good. For the 
wilfully bad character there waits a worse Inferno 
than Dante's, viz. the continuance and growth of 
itself. Whether that growth will or can ever be 



254 WHAT IS THE CHRISTIAN 

reversed, belongs to the hidden mysteries of eternity, 
which are far too many, too great, too deep, too 
complex, too difficult, for any human solution. All 
we know is all we need to know. There is a Hell 
— and it will be Hell. 

For the pure and noble character, no matter in 
how many grades existing, there waits a better 
Heaven than any poet's Paradiso, even the main- 
tenance and growth of those unmeasured capacities 
for good which here are little more than embryonic. 
Then will be the development, beyond our ter- 
restrial conception, of all that was here dimly guessed 
at — as a " subliminal consciousness " — through com- 
munion with the better-known Source of all good, 
and with kindred spirits who are ceaselessly becom- 
ing greater and worthier under the same ennobling 
influences. 

Thus the main elements of the Christian hope of 
immortality are three. Personality, without which 
nothing is anything ; God, the Source of all good, as 
revealed in Jesus Christ, without communion with 
Whom eternity would be only an empty Nirvana ; 
unlimited love-communion with others, compared 
with which the loves of earth are but fitful mixtures 
of flash and shadow. To the worthy blending of 
these three, no thought-limit whatever can be set 
by human science, or philosophy, or theology. The 
glorious possibilities of the future are boundless. 
They are no more necessarily a mirage, than the 
loftiest human character is a mirage when viewed 
from the standpoint of the new-born babe. If, 
therefore, in the words of the noblest poem here- 
upon ever conceived, there be — as there is — un- 
measured comfort in a negation — 

Thou wilt not leave us in the dust, 

Thou madest man, he knows not why ; 
He thinks he was not made to die ; 

And Thou hast made him ; Thou art just — 



DOCTRINE OF IMMORTALITY? 255 

there is still more to console and enhearten, amidst 
life's burdens, sorrows and conflicts, in the positive 
assurance of the Christian Gospel. This answers 
to our deepest yearnings, and is confirmed by all the 
truth of which Jesus Christ is pledge for evermore. 

That each, who seems a separate whole, 
Should move his rounds, and fusing all 
The skirts of self again, should fall 

Remerging in the general Soul 

Is faith as vague as all unsweet : 

Eternal form shall still divide 

The eternal soul from all beside ; 
And I shall know him when we meet ; 

And we shall sit at endless feast, 
Enjoying each the other's good ; 
What vaster dream can hit the mood 
Of Love on earth ? 

Here, then, abides for every true believer, a three- 
fold inspiration — the comfort of faith, the patience of 
hope, the assurance of love — which is growing ever 
clearer and stronger, in spite of all the obscurantism 
of the friends, or virulence of the foes, of Christianity. 
In the degree in which the modern mind is set free 
from past delusions — from the theological fictions of 
a long post mortem sleep, or an " Intermediate state " ; 
from the unwarranted and impossible notion of a far 
distant " day " for the spectacular holding of some 
mammoth human assize ; from the gruesome and 
revolting representations of a Hell of everlasting 
torment ; as well as from the uninviting prospect of 
a vapid, childish, pietistic Heaven — it may reasonably 
be hoped that this inspiration will become more real, 
more widespread, more precious, more potent, for 
every succeeding generation of mankind. Then may 
it well be said : — " Blessed be the God and Father of 
our Lord Jesus Christ, who in his great mercy has 
begotten us anew to an ever-living hope, through 
the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead " 



WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 
WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 



*7 



" The abuses and corruptions of the Church, however gross, are no 
argument against the utility of the institution, unless they can be shown 
to be inseparable from it. But however inveterate, most of them are 
strictly accidental. The root of all evil in the Church is the imagination 
that it exists for any other purpose than to foster virtue ; or can be pros- 
perous except so far as it does this. If the Church has failed, let us re- 
form it ; but we can ill afford to sever the strongest and most sacred tie 
that binds men to each other." — Prof. Seeley, " Ecce Homo". 

" If it were proposed to invent some special system in which covetous- 
ness would be deliberately fostered and intensified in human nature, what 
system could be devised which would excel our own for this purpose ? 
Competitive commerce exalts selfishness to the dignity of a moral principle. 
It pits men against one another in a gladiatorial game in which there is 
no mercy, and in which ninety per cent of the combatants finally strew 
the arena. It makes Ishmaels of our best men, and teaches them that 
their hand must be against every man, since every man's hand is against 
them. It makes men who are the gentlest and kindliest friends and 
neighbours, relentless taskmasters in their shops and stores, who will 
drain the strength of their men and pay their female employees wages on 
which no girl can live without supplementing them in some way." 

— Prof. Rauschenbusch, " Christianity and the Social Crisis". 

" Public opinion in this land invariably responds to the call of the 
united Churches. As their power is great, so is their responsibility. I do 
not agree with the view that the Church is concerned only with spiritual 
things. Those who take that view reflect on the career of their Master. 
What then is the function of the Church in reference to social evils ? It 
is not to engage in party brawls. It is not to urge or advocate any special 
measures. It is to create an atmosphere in which the rulers of this 
country not only can engage in reforming these evils, but in which it will 
be impossible for them not to do so." — Mr. Lloyd George at Cardiff. 

" To any one who knows the sluggishness of humanity to good, the 
impregnable entrenchments of vested wrongs, and the long reaches of 
time needed from one mile-stone of progress to the next, the task of setting 
up a Christian social order in this modern world of ours, seems like a fair 
and futile dream. Yet in fact it is not one tithe as hopeless as when Jesus 
set out to do it." 

— Prof. Rauschenbusch, " Christianity and the Social Crisis ". 



259 



CHAPTER IX 

WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 
WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 

The words of Christ recorded in the "Sermon on 
the Mount " give a plain and sufficient answer to 
this question — which is indeed becoming a common 
query on modern lips. If it could be demonstrated 
that both in doctrine and in fact Christian Churches 
do truly fulfil this ideal — " ye are the salt of the earth ; 
ye are the light of the world " — then the inquiry which 
here we face would be answered before it were formu- 
lated. Alas! even if the cynical criticism of Churches 
which has now become so fashionable in many 
quarters be disregarded, it would be a quixotic task 
to show that they can actually claim to be all that these 
great monosyllables imply. The words addressed to 
the representatives of the Seven Churches at the 
commencement of the last section of our New Testa- 
ment, may be only too truly said to be as appropriate 
to-day as nineteen centuries ago. " Let all who have 
ears, give heed to what the Spirit is saying to the 
Churches." Had they only done so, how different 
would have been the record of Church history and 
the whole condition of modern Christendom. Un- 
fortunately no portion of the Bible has been more 
misunderstood and misapplied, than that in which 
this stirring appeal is found. It may, indeed, be 
pleaded that this section of the New Testament 
known so long as "the Revelation of St. John the 
Divine " — is a strange and puzzling production, 
affording ample opportunity for every one enamoured 



260 WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 

of bizarre theories to find here their justification. To 
go no further back than Luther, we know how con- 
fidently Rome identified him with the anti-Christ ; 
and how vigorously Protestantism responded by 
demonstrating that the Scarlet Woman was none 
other than Rome herself. In our own times, Mil- 
lenarians of all grades have made it a complete 
manual of pious calculations for immediate Arma- 
geddons and cataclysmic Advents. The complete 
solution of its many problems may be pronounced 
impossible, 1 but its spiritual and ethical principles are 
in perfect accord with the rest of the Christian 
Scriptures. 

The Letters to the Seven Churches forcibly 
illustrate this. Circumstances have greatly altered 
since the age in which they were written. We 
live in a vastly different world from that which 
surrounded those Churches. Two things, however, 
stand out vividly. We are our own witnesses that 
the cruel persecution then raging, with the further 
onslaughts expected — which doubtless called forth 
this cryptic writing as a message intended to en- 
hearten believers during the fiery ordeal — really did 
nothing to hinder, let alone destroy, the Christian 
faith. We also see that the main truth conveyed by 
these strong yet tender appeals — viz. that the greatest 
danger to the Churches was from within, not from 
without — has been confirmed through all the ages, 
and is now more manifest than ever. 

As plain matter of fact, tragic but true, Chris- 
tianity's deadliest enemies have always been its 
avowed friends. Amidst our own present educa- 
tional problems we see that if the Bible is driven 

1 A very useful and sensible as well as scholarly little volume on 
this difficult portion of the New Testament has just been issued by 
Mr. C. A. Scott, in the "Century Bible," which ordinary readers, 
no less than preachers and teachers, would do well to study. 



WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 261 

wholly out of elementary day schools, it will not be 
by means of militant Atheism or Secularism, but by 
the very clericalism which professes to believe in its 
inspiration. Even so in generations past, the un- 
christian elements within the Church — including the 
hostile relations between various sections of it — have 
ever wrought more harm and hindrance to the 
Kingdom of Heaven which Jesus came to establish 
on earth, than all the anti-Christian opposition from 
without. It was the avowed friends of Christianity 
who, as Bishop Westcott says, poisoned the Church 
in the fourth century with the worldliness which it 
has never since wholly been able to exorcise. It was 
the professed friends of Christianity, who, in later 
times, blasted its history and influence with never- 
to-be-forgotten abominations of cruelty and horror 
in the Romish Inquisition and St. Bartholomew's 
massacre. Too well we know that there were not 
wanting Protestant analogues. The religious bar- 
renness and prevalent animalism of the eighteenth 
century in this land, were not due to the energy of 
unbelief, but to the hollowness of belief. 

We are beginning the twentieth century, it may 
be said, under better auspices. Which is happily 
true. But it affords no ground whatever for easy- 
going optimism. Whilst the Churches have cer- 
tainly been growing in numbers, the population has 
been increasing still more rapidly. The very de- 
velopments of science and literature which have 
helped to purify and enlarge Christian conceptions, 
are now proclaiming themselves independent of any 
Christian sanctions at all. Moreover, the wonderful 
cheapening of all issues from the modern press has 
put into the hands of militant unbelief such a weapon 
of offence as they have never had before ; and fullest 
advantage has been and is being taken of it to 
assault everything Christian with a virulent effective- 



262 WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 

ness hitherto unparalleled. From all which it comes 
to pass that Christianity is to-day in an utterly un- 
precedented condition. It is equally better and 
worse than ever before. There are in our modern 
midst more and better Christians than the world 
has ever seen. But there is at the same time a 
larger proportion than ever of our fellow-men — even 
in this country, to say nothing of the Continent, or 
America — who treat religion in general with in- 
difference, and Christianity in particular as if it were 
but a doubtful or ^optional trifle. Church Con- 
gresses and Free Church Conferences are no 
doubt pleasant social gatherings, and hopeful signs 
of the times, but they have not been able to prevent 
either repeated decreases in Church membership, 
or dwindling attendances at public worship. They 
do, indeed, little or nothing to alter the fact that 
four-fifths of the population of this most Christian 
country in the world, are outside all the Churches ; 
whilst the modern atmosphere is tending more and 
more every year to increase such a proportion. 
How serious is the modern situation in these re- 
spects has recently been pointed out by the Bampton 
Lecturer already mentioned, who cannot be accused 
of pessimistic bias, but who chose as his theme " The 
Reproach of the Gospel," and has justified it in 
pages which lose none of their weighty significance 
for being moderate and refined. 

If it be asked — Why such a title for avowedly 
Christian deliverances ? — let us listen again more 
carefully to his estimate, as given on a previous 
page :— 

"When we look frankly at the present state 
of Christianity from these three points, its 
alleged origin, its actual merits as a rule of life, 
and its effect upon individuals, we are forced 
to confess that its influence on mankind at large 



WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 263 

is and has been strangely disproportionate alike 
to its high claims, and to the reasonable expecta- 
tions of those who saw its beginnings." 1 

This is a very mild statement of facts which are 
in these days often put with ruthless bluntness. 
The Christian Church, we are told, is actually failing 
whilst it seems to succeed. New churches are being 
built, certainly, in goodly numbers, but as many old 
ones are left empty. Even as churches spring up 
in new suburban neighbourhoods, the masses of the 
people in all our great cities are being more and 
more alienated from worship, let alone membership, 
by social problems, whilst the better-educated 
classes are rendered hesitating or indifferent by 
critical difficulties. And all this, after nineteen 
centuries of opportunity, in the most Christian 
country in the world. Is it possible for any truly 
Christian mind to survey such a condition of affairs 
with equanimity ? There may yet be some avowed 
believers found to echo the sentiment of which a 
well-known American divine recently delivered him- 
self, in a leading religious journal — "I thank God 
that the Church is not commissioned to save the 
world ". But they are surely few who will join in 
such a thanksgiving. For it inevitably raises the 
question — What then are churches for? As the 
Lecturer just quoted says, the plain issue must be 
faced — " whether Christ intended His Church to be 
universal, or to be but a limited body of believers 
saved out of a lost world ". This latter Calvinistic 
suggestion — the ultimate significance of which is an 
elect few who cannot but be saved, and a vast 
majority decreed to eternal ruin — has mercifully 
become repulsive and intolerable to the Christian 
conscience. 

1 Rev. J. H. F. Peile, " Bampton Lectures for 1907," p. 14. 



264 WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 

Had it been the purpose of Christianity merely 
to save, in another world, a few out of the wreck of 
this world, it might certainly claim to have suc- 
ceeded. But it would in such case proclaim itself 
to be of little or no avail for the solution of the 
human problems of the twentieth century ; though 
these, after all, only differ in quantity from those 
which Jesus Himself so unflinchingly confronted in 
the first century. Such an avowal of limitation as 
the above-quoted thanksgiving involves, is utterly 
at variance with the whole teaching of Christ, and 
with the foundation principles of Christianity. If it 
be true at all that "God is love," then that love 
must embrace all humanity, without respect of 
persons. Whether we can apprehend all the age- 
long world-wide workings of that love or not, the 
plain duty of the Christian Church is to bring 
home to the very utmost of its power, this greatest 
of all messages to the heart of the race. Mr. Peile, 
indeed, hints at the coming of a new movement in 
modern life and thought which will " if Christianized, 
make the world Christian ". Then like an honest 
writer, he bethinks himself of what he has said, and 
adds : — 

"To make the world Christian! The words 
imply a revolution so tremendous that the mere 
naming of it moves experience to an incredulous 
smile and makes enthusiasm itself falter. And 
yet it is the task which our Lord laid upon His 
disciples, the task in which all Christians, lay 
or cleric, man or woman, are solemnly pledged 
to take their part." 

How far the modern world is from being Chris- 
tian, or " all who profess and call themselves Chris- 
tians " from taking " their part " towards making it 
so, may be left to the honest verdict of any intellig- 
ent observer. 



WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 265 

It cannot, of course, be denied that a great deal has 
been accomplished and is yet being done in our day 
by the Christian Church. Besides all the results 
tabulated in history — when fairly estimated 1 — Chris- 
tianity represents in our modern midst an unparal- 
leled and incalculable expenditure of time, energy, 
money, devotion, spent upon highest and worthiest 
purposes. No one can honestly call this in question. 2 
Nor is there any real ground whatever for doubting 
either that it will continue or that it will increase. 
The great matter now to be estimated is the worth 
and extent, the quality and quantity, of its general in- 
fluence upon the modern world. What has humanity 
gained or lost, during the centuries of the Christian 
era, from the existence and work of the Church in 

1 It is so notoriously the custom of anti-Christian writers to lay 
all stress on the dark side of Church history, as if there were no 
other, that it is correspondingly refreshing to find a " Rationalist " 
of Lord Morley's calibre administering a well-deserved rebuke to 
this untruthful one-sidedness. " We get very wearied of the per- 
sistent identification of the Church throughout the dark ages with 
fraud and imposture and self-seeking, when we have once learned 
what is undoubtedly the most important principle in the study of 
those times, viz. that it was the Churchmen who kept alive the 
flickering light of civilization amid the raging storms of uncontrolled 
passion and violence." 

2 Thus the latest and most effective popular opponent writes : 
"The Christians have virtual command of all the churches, uni- 
versities and schools. They have the countenance and support of 
the thrones, Parliaments, Cabinets, and aristocracies of the world, 
and they have behind them the nominal support of the world's 
newspaper press. They have behind them the traditions of eighteen 
centuries. They have formidable allies in the shape of whole 
schools of philosophy and whole libraries of eloquence and learning. 
They have the zealous service and unswerving credence of millions 
of honest and worthy, citizens ; and they are defended by solid 
ramparts of prejudice and sentiment and obstinate old custom " 
(" God and My Neighbour," R. Blatchford, p. 149). Even when 
some discount is deducted from such an estimate, it is a large con- 
fession, considering the state of affairs contemplated by the book 
of Revelation. 



266 WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 

all its branches ? What is the worth to the modern 
world of all the public worship and private devotion, 
the labour and the sacrifice, the measureless ex- 
penditure of mind and heart, which are increasingly 
associated with the Christian faith ? Suppose that 
its opponents could be obliged 1 by the wholesale 
fulfilment of their wish, in the destruction of all the 
churches and their influence, would the effect be 
unmeasured loss, or gain ? 

In any case this is a great question. In this 
country, at all events, if not also in Europe, the total 
destruction of Christian Churches would mean no- 
thing less than a different world. As Sir John 
Seeley wrote in his famous " Ecce Homo " : — 

" It is idle for any virtue that springs up in 
the neighbourhood of the Christian Church 
to claim to be independent of it. Christian 
influences are in the air ; our very conception 
of virtue is Christian ; the tone, the habits of 
sentiment and language — in short, all the 
associations of virtue — have been furnished by 
the discipline of the Christian Church. ... It is 
the only institution which is distinctively and 
deliberately virtue-making, and the one which 
inherits the most complete ideal of virtue." 

Coming from such a source, this estimate cannot 
be pronounced ecclesiastically biassed. Its substan- 
tial truth may be assumed. In face of it, much of 
the cheap abuse of the Churches in these days is 
seen to be unworthy of notice. When, however, 
the assertion is roundly made that "Christianity 
does not make men lead better lives than others lead 

1 "The churches must be smashed." — R. Blatchford. 

" One of the greatest social needs of our time, is to sweep away 
the whole tottering structure of conventional religion and worship." 
—Mr. Jos. McCabe. 



WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 26; 

who are not Christians " — we must have patience 
with the superficial tirade of anti-Christian journal- 
ism, for the sake of the valid principle of comparison 
which such an allegation embodies. It is, indeed, 
not only a challenge which modern Christianity can 
in no way evade, but also a true echo to well-known 
and emphatic words of Christ Himself, such as can 
neither be forgotten nor ignored. 

Out of a fair, full, and steady survey of the whole 
situation, one clear certainty emerges. Whether it 
finds expression in the reckless virulence of popular 
journals or the academic utterances of a university 
Professor, the conclusion is the same. It is made 
plain by the facts of daily life ; emphasized in the 
enormous growth of modern populations; thrown 
up into lurid relief by the pressure of social problems. 
It is accentuated by the advance of science, the 
development of criticism, the increase of theological 
unrest. The religious status quo is doomed. Chris- 
tianity, as represented by the Churches, will have to 
be either mended or ended. The crucible into which 
modern religion is being cast, as we advance into 
the present century, is such as the world has never 
before known ; and only that which is true to the 
uttermost, whether intellectually or morally, scien- 
tifically or spiritually, will stand the test. The 
worth of the Church to the world must no doubt 
ultimately depend upon the worth of the individual 
believer to the Church. But before the latter can be 
made matter for personal appeal, the former must be 
clearly set forth as a true and worthy ideal. The 
homely but searching question — What are Churches 
for ? is thus simply inevitable. Until it is frankly 
faced, and unequivocally answered, there is no 
standard whereby any member of a Christian 
Church may test his own worth or worthlessness ; 
nor is there any rational ground of appeal for the 



268 WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 

appreciation and maintenance of Christianity as a 
factor in the progress of humanity. 

Leaving elaboration in detail to the volumes, or 
libraries, which may be necessary, the required 
answer to the pressing question can be stated with 
definite succinctness and with comprehensive brevity. 
Prof. Burkitt summed up the whole situation most 
truly when, a short time since, he wrote that — 

"The Christian Church to-day is in the posi- 
tion that Crosb}^ Hall occupied a few years ago, 
and if it is to be preserved, it must convince men 
that it provides what they cannot do without." 

No statement can be more pertinent, or more sure. 
It corresponds both to the facts of our day and the 
principles of the Gospel. If Christian Churches are 
veritably "the salt of the earth and the light of the 
world," then humanity will never let them go. For 
they are, in such case, unmistakable and irresistible 
necessities. If they are other or less than this, then 
they will be swallowed up — slowly may be, but 
surely — in the advancing tide of a civilization which 
finds that it can do without them. On what plain 
lines can the challenge of such a situation be met ? 
On these. The immeasurable worth to mankind of 
the Catholic Church of Jesus Christ, as represented 
by the various sections which compose it — the " many 
members in one body," or many folds in " one flock " 
— is fourfold. It relates with unmistakable distinct- 
ness to God ; to man ; to the whole of this life ; and 
to a life to come. More fully expressed, this means 
that Christian Churches exist in order that they may 
bear unique, unequivocal, and ceaseless witness, to 
four great principles of truth. These are so im- 
portant and comprehensive that all other interests 
are small by comparison. Men can no more " do 
without " them, in view of human nature's needs, 



WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 269 

capacities, and hopes, than the boy who would be- 
come a noble man can do without the discipline of 
education. 

These great principles, the enforcement and illus- 
tration of which constitute the very raison d'Stre of 
the Christian Church, are (1) The actuality of God, 
and the significance of His relation to the world as 
revealed in Jesus Christ. (2) The ennobling effect 
of the knowledge of this relation upon human char- 
acter. (3) The consequent larger effect for good of 
this ideal of character upon human society in general. 
(4) The final issue of the whole human episode now 
being enacted upon this planet, alike as regards the 
individual and the race. These four manifestly de- 
serve far more thorough discussion than can be ac- 
corded them here. But our purpose will be served 
if we look them earnestly, even though briefly, in the 
face. 

Whatever else may be said to characterize this 
age, it is undeniable that greater numbers than ever 
are hungry for the truth, in regard to themselves, 
their fellows, and the universe. Only it must be the 
truth, and not mere tradition. It must accord with 
reason, and not simply reiterate ecclesiastical dogma. 
It must be the veritable bread of life, and not theo- 
logical stones. Life's supreme issues are not decided 
now, nor ever again will be, by authoritative pro- 
nouncements of either priest or Church. Such 
methods of settlement in human affairs have had 
their day and ceased to be. But if these four can be 
secured ; the highest truth ; the noblest character ; 
the broadest sympathy ; the largest hope ; they will 
constitute more than sufficient reason for the con- 
tinuance of the existence and work of Christian 
Churches. Of all men who deserve the name, out- 
side the Churches, it may be boldly said that they 
cannot do without these. And to all inside, the 



270 WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 

words of the writer of our Second Epistle of Peter 
will apply with far more force in the twentieth 
century than f in the second — "If these things are 
yours and abound, they make you to be neither in- 
dolent nor unfruitful, with respect to the true know- 
ledge of our Lord Jesus Christ ". With all modest 
deliberateness, but with earnest and unhesitating 
emphasis it must be said, that upon the degree in 
which those who belong to the Churches are or are 
not faithful to the high commission these four great 
principles imply, depends not only the value of 
Christianity to the world of this day, but the 
certainty of its continuance or decay during the 
century before us. Let us, therefore, restate them 
as clearly as is possible in few words. 

i. The highest truth. Christian Churches are 
witnesses for the Christ of the Gospels, and for the 
whole content of His meaning when He assured 
the disciples that through Him they would find the 
"pearl of great price". "Ye shall know the truth, 
and the truth will make you free." The Christian 
claim is that in Him, and in all He said, and did, and 
was, are to be found valid answers to such questions 
as only men, of all creatures on earth, can ask, but 
which they are constrained to ask by reason of their 
very powers of thought and capacity of nature. To 
no other creature on earth than man, is "truth" 
anything at all. But although there may yet be 
many Pilates in civilization, the normal man who 
has left savagery behind, can never ask with scorn 
— " What is truth ? " It may be taken as a genuine 
sign of the upward evolution of the race, that all 
truth is in our day increasingly precious, even to the 
average man. For the Christian Church, unless it 
be utterly corrupt, the truth must ever be the 
treasure beyond all compare. "Whatsoever things 



WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 271 

are true — cherish the thought of these things " — as 
enunciated by Paul, 1 is and must always be the veri- 
table Magna Charta of Christian liberty of mind and 
heart. Such an ideal not only sets the genuine 
believer for ever free from all ecclesiastical bondage, 
but binds upon him the duty of fullest appreciation 
of all that science and art and literature can teach 
him. But "whatsoever " is a wider term than any 
one of these, or all of them combined. It contem- 
plates the possibility of another realm of truth, be- 
yond and above all the information and inspiration 
that may be derived from these ordinary human 
sources. It suggests, indeed, that by very means 
of their help there comes to pass both the need 
and the opportunity for something higher and still 
more precious. 

That which is true concerning man, can never be 
fully appreciated without also a knowledge of the 
truth concerning God. Human nature remains an 
insoluble problem until it is surveyed in " the light 
that never was on sea or land," i.e. plainly — to use the 
language of one of the most significant utterances of 
the whole New Testament — " the light of the know- 
ledge of the glory of God, in the face of Jesus Christ " 
As the universe without the thought of God is un- 
thinkable, so that we do not believe in God because 
we may but because we must ; so is man, an in- 
finitesimal but real speck in the universe, as inex- 
plicable without God, and withal as helpless, as the 
fish without the ocean. The mind of man which in 
all its mystery is at least a pragmatic certainty, can 
no more find rest in its ceaseless investigation of 
phenomena without God, than the dove sent forth 
from Noah's ark could settle until it returned to its 
refuge. And the poor little lark pitifully confined 

1 Phil. iv. 8. 



272 WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 

in its narrow cage, does not more restlessly preen 
its wings and pine for the celestial blue, than the 
heart of humanity for some real knowledge of and 
communion with the Great Unknown to whom, or 
to which, man feels himself related. The history of 
the evolution of religion upon which so much modern 
stress is laid, abundantly testifies to this, in pathetic 
and pitiful as well as often tragic and lurid fashion. 
" The golden bough " and "The dying god," with 
all the weird and staggering rituals they connote, 
are but specimens of the poor blind groping of an 
evolving humanity for something measurelessly 
higher, stronger, more helpful than themselves. 

In our own modern environment greatest things 
have become small' through familiarity. God as 
our Heavenly Father, man as the moral heir of 
immortality, Christ as the Divine-human Redeemer, 
the Bible with its estimate of sin and ideal of holi- 
ness, are to the majority of our fellow-countrymen 
to-day mere trite commonplaces. To increasing 
numbers they are all but verbal trifles ; to others 
sheer delusion. The estimate of our Bampton Lec- 
turer is only too true to fact : — 

"Not only the Church but Christianity it- 
self and all supernatural religion are called in 
question, or dismissed as not worth calling in 
question. On one hand we have a compara- 
tively small force of active and articulate hos- 
tility, which has its value as a stimulus to closer 
thought and more energetic work. On the 
other we are oppressed by the dead weight of 
spiritual inertia, a widespread and profound in- 
difference to dogma as the guide and motive of 
action." l 

1 p. 1 8. 



WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 273 

Amidst all this modern complication, the outstand- 
ing certainty is that whatever may be worthy, in- 
difference is unworthy. Whoever may be right, the 
belittler of the issues is wrong. The themes for 
thought and interests at stake are, beyond all con- 
troversy, great. They can only be small as a star 
is small, to a thoughtless eye. The untaught country 
swain may deem Sirius a trifle compared with the 
moon. But even the child, as now educated, knows 
better. When with the eye of scientific scrutiny we 
draw near to that far-off point of light, we are over- 
whelmed to find that whilst our own sun is five 
hundred times greater than all the planets which 
encircle it put together, Sirius is equal to some 
sixty of our suns. So much may distance and un- 
thinking familiarity deceive us. It is no less true 
that amidst the whole whirl of present-day civilisa- 
tion, our thronging business, our social problems, the 
discoveries of science, and the fascinations of litera- 
ture, the great principles for which Christian 
Churches stand eclipse all these clamorous interests 
both in significance and in value to humanity. It 
is not a rhapsodical phrase but a sober truth, that on 
their acceptance or rejection turns the future of our 
race. 

That such an assertion will in some quarters 
provoke a cynical smile, and in others a storm of 
dissent, goes without saying. But neither smile 
nor frown avails to alter the fact that the truth con- 
cerning God, and the Bible, and Jesus Christ, when 
all the ideals, duties, comforts, hopes, and inspira- 
tions which follow from it are considered — is fraught 
with immeasurable consequences alike for indi- 
viduals, nations, and the race. Even if there were 
no fairer aspect of the case than is afforded by the 
usual cynical criticism of religious history, it would 
still be true that from all the recorded or alleged 

18 



274 WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 

mischiefs which have in the past been associated 
with the Christian Church, we and our children 
need to be preserved. No one can deny the actual- 
ity and costliness of the many faults and failures 
which have in past centuries blighted Church history. 
They have afforded only too ample scope for the 
sneerer. But this is not the whole case. Only 
wilful and perverse ignorance can pretend that it is 
a fair representation of what Christianity has meant 
to western humanity, during these eighteen cen- 
turies. Our above-quoted Regius Professor of 
history at Cambridge, whose ability and impartiality 
are beyond question, affirms distinctly, after the 
very frankest acknowledgment of Christian im- 
perfections : — 

11 All this may be conceded without conceding 
for a moment that the world can do without 
Christ and His Church. If a high and complete 
morality often exists outside the Church, it 
does not often exist independent of it. The 
atmosphere of Europe has been saturated for 
some fifteen centuries with Christian principles, 
and however far the rebellion against the Church 
may have spread, it may still be called the 
moral university of the world, not merely the 
greatest but the only great school of virtue 
existing."' 1 

But the main matter for consideration here is not 
how far the Christian Church has been true or false 
to its high commission. It may be conceded freely 
that even yet the greatest need of Christendom is 
that Christians should be converted to Christianity. 
The real question is as to the worth, for the men 
and women of this and the coming age, of all those 
deep convictions, high ideals, unmeasured comforts, 

1 " Eece Homo," cheap edition, p. vii. 



WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 275 

duties, hopes, inspirations, which are inseparable 
from the doctrine of God as given to men — accord- 
ing to the whole New Testament record — in and 
by Jesus Christ. 

The value for humanity of the knowledge of God, 
must of course depend upon the character attributed 
to Him by any religion. It goes without saying 
that the Christian Church is pledged to the Divine 
Fatherhood, 1 which, as an actual truth, comes directly 
and unequivocally from Christ alone. Other re- 
ligions and religious teachers have given hints of 
such a conception, but they were little more, even 
in the Old Testament, than wistful longings wherein 
the thought was begotten by the wish. None other 
than Jesus has ever said, with a dignified simplicity 
which rules out for ever all notion of fanatic en- 
thusiasm — " He that hath seen Me, hath seen the 
Father ". That is the world's greatest utterance ; 
and its worth to humanity is so unquestionable and 
immeasurable, that only one query is left concerning 
it, viz. is it true ? — or is it too good to be true ? To 
give a firm, clear, reliable answer to this, is the first 
great work and worth of the Christian Church. 

Beside this, all else is trifling. Compared with 
this assertion — including all that flows from it — all 
ecclesiastical systems, creeds, forms of government, 
dignities, ceremonies, conventions, are as the small 
dust of the balance. It cannot, indeed, be honestly 
denied that the true doctrine of God has suffered 

1 There are, it must be confessed, occasional utterances to the 
contrary, as hinted on a previous page (112). "It is marvellous 
indeed that in these days there should still be found any in the Free 
Churches who think that they are honouring the Gospel and paying 
highest regard to the New Testament, by employing a few picked 
passages, irrespective of their context, to contravene the unmistak- 
able doctrine of Jesus, and so mutilate the very soul and substance 
of His whole message to humanity ". But such belated Calvinism 
is happily only held now by an insignificant minority, who may 
be neglected in a general statement like that above. 



276 WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 

sadly at the hands of its professed exponents. Its 
actual distortion, through the intervention of ec- 
clesiasticism and false theology, has been and some- 
times yet is lamentable in the extreme. Probably 
most of the modern recoil from the Churches finds 
here its ultimate cause. But it need not be so. Any 
form of Church government may be a channel for 
the communication of the supreme truth which as- 
sures mankind of the actual and eternal love of the 
God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. A good 
illustration occurs in the noble volume by Mr. Peile 
to which reference has so often been made. As ex- 
amining chaplain to a bishop he expresses manfully 
his own conviction : — 

"I am a firm believer in the Sacrament of 
Holy Orders. I deliberately call it a sacrament as 
being neither a magical ceremony nor merely a 
decent form with no particular meaning. I 
would not abate or change one word of our 
Ordination service, for I hold that God has 
given to the Church authority to delegate to 
the priest and the bishop spiritual functions 
which no man can rightly discharge unless he 
be duly ordained thereto." 

Many of us could not herein follow him, because 
we find no place for either priest or historic epis- 
copate, in the constitution of Christ's Kingdom upon 
earth. But we rejoice to know that from his stand- 
point such a Christian teacher can say, and does 
say, as heartily as any Nonconformist : — 

"There is nothing but a belief in the Father- 
hood of God and the Oneness of men with Him 
and in Him, that can make us think of others and 
treat them as brethren, seeing our good in their 
good. . . . If we could learn and teach these two 
lessons of the Fatherhood of God, to care for 



WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 277 

others, and to put away over care for ourselves ; 
a good many of our economic problems would 
be solved by ceasing to exist." 1 

From the true appreciation of the Divine Father- 
hood as here hinted, there cannot but flow conse- 
quences of highest import to all human society. 
This brings us to the consideration of the value of 
Christian ethics. To elaborate this would require 
a treatise. 2 For our purpose here, it will be suffi- 
cient and convenient to summarize the Christian 
claim in the well-chosen words of one who ought 
not to be wholly forgotten. The late esteemed and 
erudite Professor of Latin at Owens College, Man- 
chester, wrote : — 

" Not only because the system of Christian 
ethics transcends all others in purity, but be- 
cause this perfect purity is reached by a scien- 
tific method of development, is based upon a 
sure foundation, and has shown itself by far 
the most powerful help that the world has 
known for its regeneration, do we claim for it 
an origin directly and immediately Divine. 

" We are able to assert, in spite of the protest 
that misconceptions have raised against such a 
tenet, that one characteristic which distinguishes 
Christian from pagan ethics, is their unblem- 
ished perfection and completeness. Christianity 
supplies to man in every condition of life prin- 
ciples which were calculated to mould and 
fashion him into a model of all that his heart 
has recognized as purest and best. And where 
the application of these principles might have 

1 " Bampton Lectures," 1907, pp. 97, 186. 

2 Such as, say, Dr. Newman Smyth's "Christian Ethics," — in 
the International Theological Library, published by Messrs. T. and 
T. Clark. 



278 WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 

been doubtful, or likely to be mistaken, it has 
supplemented them by specific precepts." 1 

Here, again, the only possible reply to the as- 
sertion of the value of such an ethical standard and 
stimulus for humanity, is to den} T that it is true. 
This may of course be done, even as to-day anything 
and everything Christian is, in some quarters, 
denied. But the denial is sufficiently met elsewhere, 
to permit the claim to be here maintained that, 
speaking generally, nothing is fraught with such 
great importance to the well-being of humanity as 
the great truths and principles for which the 
Christian Churches stand. 

As these pages are written from the standpoint of 
a liberal Evangelicalism, it is pertinent to remark 
that the contribution of the Evangelical Churches to 
the true appreciation and application of the doctrines 
and ideals of Christianity, as the embodiment of the 
highest truth that can concern men, has been both 
vast and permanent. It were easy, of course, to 
point out their failures, especially in insisting too 
often on a rigid narrowness of theological interpreta- 
tion, and in the assumption of credal finality. Even 
yet it cannot be denied that the pious imagination 
largely prevails that all the truth about God, and 
Christ, and the Bible, and human nature, has been 
made out; so that, in regard to the essentials of 
Christian faith, nothing remains for us but to echo 
the convictions of our fathers. But such a delusion 
grows less and less operative every year. In the 
light of to-day all those great assumptions upon 
which Church work and worship depend, require 
increasingly to be both purified and justified. Such 
a process of theological evolution is happily taking 

1 " The Light of the World, 5 ' by Prof. A. S. Wilkins— a valuable 
little volume unfortunately now out of print, pp. 146, 180. 



WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 279 

place, as resistlessly as gradually, to the unmeasured 
benediction of all concerned. 

Whilst, however, the fierce light of our modern 
knowledge pierces all theologies through and through, 
it yet leaves the world of inquiring minds largely in 
the dark as regards the very subjects which it 
criticises. Hence there is more need than ever that 
in the very highest sense the Churches should be " the 
light of the world," no less than pragmatically, "the 
salt of the earth ". Preachers are now called upon 
to be teachers, and hearers learners, as never before. 
True, there are many in pulpits who cannot teach, as 
there are also in pews who will not learn. But these, 
however sincere, must be regarded as invalids, and 
must neither be allowed to rule, nor taken as satis- 
factory types of Christian belief. If the New Testa- 
ment is at all to be regarded, the Churches are just 
as really schools for moral and spiritual truth, as 
day-schools and universities are for science and 
literature. The vastness of such a commission may 
well give modern believers pause ; but nothing can 
revoke it, or lessen it, or make it trifling. It is easy to 
say — as did a prominent preacher in the metropolis 
recently — that "an ounce of witness is worth a ton 
of argument, and one pulse of the love-life is more 
than equal to a whole shelf full of dry-as-dust Chris- 
tian apologetics ". But, however well meant, such 
talk may be very misleading. Who invented the 
hideous term "apologetics" we may neither know 
nor care. But it is a libel on Christ Himself and on 
all the New Testament, to insinuate that reasons for 
faith must be " dry as dust " — and that all required 
to-day is emotional "witness," altogether indepen- 
dent of argument. Every fanatic delivers his witness 
with fervour. To pit emotion against reason, in the 
name of Christian devotion, is a counsel of delusion. 
What is needed more than ever, in our day, is the 



280 WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 

ceaseless blending of both. For, as the late Mr. 
Aubrey L. Moore truly said, "The human mind 
craves to be both religious and rational, and he who 
is not both, is neither ". 

The ceaseless pains and care, the study and devo- 
tion, the humility and earnestness, which are hereby 
demanded from every Christian Church, i.e. from all 
its officers and members alike, may well be pro- 
nounced measureless. But as these are in some 
degree needed for all noble endeavour, it is only 
natural that they should be most required for the 
highest of all purposes. Let the truths of science, 
and art, and literature, and philosophy, and politics, 
be deemed as important as their devotees insist ; it 
yet remains true that nothing can ultimately be of 
such import to mankind as the truth or falsity of 
all that is connoted in the Christian phrase " Eternal 
life ". The Church exists, therefore, in order to 
make clear and effective for the world at large that 
which, hereupon, it knows and proves to be true. 

2. The noblest character. 

Such an aim as that just specified, can never be 
attained by the mere teaching of theology, however 
accurate and exalted. " Eternal life" — "that they 
should know Thee, the only true God and Jesus 
Christ whom thou hast sent " — can never be ex- 
hibited, let alone proved, to mankind by creeds, or 
schemes, or systems, of any kind. Character alone 
can either represent or justify such ideals of duty, 
and inspirations towards their attainment, as are in- 
separable from the great Christian assumptions. 
Who can fail to see that the ruthless criticism and 
uncompromising opposition of our time will never 
be appeased, let alone silenced, by words alone? 
We are bluntly asked by popular unbelief: — 



WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 281 

" Are there no good, nor happy, nor worthy 
men and women to-day outside the pale of 
the Christian Churches? Amongst the eight 
hundred millions of human beings who do not 
know or do not follow Christ, are there none 
as happy and as worthy *as any who follow 
Him?" 1 

The only effective reply must be an appeal to Chris- 
tian character. Is that character, on the average, 
higher, or not higher, than the non-Christian ? Still 
further, as regards individuals,) the inquiry is pressed 
home : — 

" You speak of the spiritual value of your 
religion. What can it give you more than 
Socrates or Buddha possessed? These men 
had wisdom, courage, morality, fortitude, love,, 
mercy. Can you find in all the world to-day 
two men as wise, as good, as gentle, as happy ? 
Yet these men died centuries before Christ was 
born." 

Such questions can in these days neither be pre- 
vented nor evaded. Nor is there any Christian 
reason why they should be. For they are neither 
more nor less than an echo of Christ's own words — 
"If ye love them that love you, what reward have 
ye ? Do not even the publicans the same ? And 
if ye salute your brethren only, what extra do 
ye ? Do not even the Gentiles the same ? " This 
" extra " — which is at once the most literally ac- 
curate rendering of the word attributed to Christ 
by the Evangelist, and the most distinctive feature 
of His ethical law — constitutes the practical sine qua 
non of Christianity. 

The greatest pragmatic heresy of popular religion 

1 " God and My Neighbour," p. 172. 



282 WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 

in our midst, is that Christian character and good 
character are one and the same. But the words of 
Jesus are as unmistakable to the contrary as the 
protests of modern unbelief are irrepressible. The 
vast significance of the truth in this regard, must 
be sufficient apology for repeating what has already 
been remarked hereupon in a preceding section. 1 It 
is quite undeniable that there are thousands of our 
fellow-countrymen, outside all the Churches, who 
are in many real respects good. 2 " I suggest " — says 
the author just quoted — " that consolation, and forti- 
tude, and cheerfulness, and loving-kindness, are not 
in the exclusive gift of the Christian religion but 
may be found by good men in all religions." And 
he might with equal truth have added, in men 
of no religion. The old notion that Christian 
goodness had to be established by denying all other 
goodness, has long since been dismissed from honest 
thought as but a pious delusion. The value of the 
Christian ideal has to be made clear, not by denying 
but by exceeding all other goodness. No words can 
possibly be plainer than Christ's own to this effect. 
11 1 say to you that except your righteousness shall 
exceed that of the scribes and Pharisees, ye will in no 
wise enter into the Kingdom of Heaven." Nor is 
there any difficulty at all in applying this principle 
to modern life. Professor Seeley expressed the truth 
most aptly in one word when he wrote that " Prob- 
ably no one will deny that in Christian countries 
this higher-toned goodness, which we call holiness, has 
existed ". The term " holiness " is even yet strangely 

1 See pp. 1 19- 12 1. 

2 Out of the unnumbered host take one which happens to be in the 
press as these pages are being written. Of a certain well-known 
Professor who is said to be " the most learned of modern explorers," 
it is affirmed that he is " a man of the highest personal character, as 
well known and fully trusted in England as in his own country. He 
possesses the confidence of scientific experts, while his lovable per- 
sonality endears him to all." And yet he is an avowed Agnostic ! 



WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 283 

repellent to the majority of men, 1 but its true inter- 
pretation as the " higher-toned goodness," is the very 
soul and substance of the Christian character-ideal. 

It is the incarnation of this, in all life's actualities, 
which constitutes at once the commission of the 
Church and its worth to the world. The teaching 
of the truth alone, be it ever so transcendent, can 
never suffice. Let all creeds and beliefs, from any 
and every section of the universal Church, be taken 
at their best ; it must yet be owned that doctrines 
are but ideals, and sermons are nothing more than 
suggestions. That which is absolutely necessary, 
if mankind are to be really influenced by Christian 
ideals, is the incarnation of these in personal char- 
acter. Religious homilies, however sincere and 
stimulating, are but as the flash of a meteor. Mass 
meetings of enthusiastic believers may be very in- 
spiring, but they are just as transient. Whereas 
crops are ripened not by lightning flashes or 
swarms of Leonids, but by the persistent shining of 
the sun, even so will the unique and constant char- 
acteristics which are included in " this higher-toned 
goodness which we call holiness," alone avail to bring 
to pass a truly Christian civilization. 

Alas ! what does our modern Lecturer say, speak- 
ing with all the measured mildness of cultured re- 
straint, and from the most sympathetic standpoint ? 

1 Such shrinking may be partly due to the mixture of pietism with 
unloveliness, or even hypocrisy, which has sometimes labelled itself as 
holy. But so long as we have an open New Testament, nothing can 
excuse the gross cartooning occasionally found in popular attacks on 
Christian principles. When, after the false and foolish representation 
of holiness already quoted (p. 120), the author of "God and My 
Neighbour " asks, — " What have we to do with such dreamy, self- 
centred emotional holiness here and now in London ? " — it is enough 
to reply — As much as we have with Socialistic anarchy, free love, and 
universal looting. For these latter are quite as fairly attributed to 
Socialism, as the contemptible traits of character he adduces are to 
Christian holiness. 



284 WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 

After the remark already quoted 1 as to " the great 
religious difficulty of the present day," he proceeds — 

" We are told that whole classes of our fellow- 
countrymen have drifted away from any kind 
of systematic religion, and the chief cause of 
this departure is the impression that outward 
religious observance and the acceptance of 
creeds, make no difference in action and in 
character; that people who go to church are 
no better than those who do not." 

What is to be said in reply to such a statement ? 

Well, certainly not less than the Lecturer himself 

adds — 

"We know that this charge against Church 
and Churchmen is not wholly true, but it is 
true enough to be widely accepted, and very 
difficult to disprove ; and the belief in its truth 
has incalculable influence in driving men not 
only from the church but from Christianity 
altogether." 

The two truths most vividly emergent from any 
such survey of the modern facts, are, that character 
is necessarily personal, and that the genuine Christian 
character — which is, in one word, "holiness "—is 
distinct from ordinary goodness. 

As to the former, there can be no such thing as a 
mass of character ; any more than there could be even 
the possibility of character at all, if man were the 
mere " creature of heredity and environment ". The 
avowed Christian definitely turns his back upon any 
so-called " Deterministic " philosophy, which would 
not only make the whole Bible a delusion, but con- 
tradict his most indubitable self-consciousness. But 
self-realization brings with it all the responsibility 

1 See p. 97. " Bampton Lectures," pp. 14, 19. The frequent 
references to these impressive and timely lectures are made on 
purpose to draw special attention to them. 



WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 285 

attaching to a living unit of power. When we speak 
of the character of a Church or of Christian 
Churches, we cannot but mean the aggregate 
influence of the personal characters of each single 
member. 

The true import of this only becomes clear when 
the second of the above specified truths is taken into 
full account. For it is manifest that if the Gospel of 
Christ be true at all, it is the assurance of most 
unique and extraordinary truth. The average good- 
ness, therefore, which may naturally be evolved from 
an advanced civilization, can never be Christianity's 
sufficient witness. Consider again, for a moment, 
Christ's own declaration: "Ye are the salt of the 
earth ". The proleptic application of this to all who 
in any age call themselves by His name, will not be 
questioned. But if we take the figure seriously, and 
carefully scrutinize our common salt, we find not 
only that it is composed of distinct particles or 
grains, but that every one of these, no matter how 
small the ultimate molecule, exhibits the indubitable 
chemical union of sodium chloride. Imagine, then, 
each man and each woman who in these days is 
accounted Christian, actually exhibiting the mind 
that was in Jesus Christ ! As a consequence, through 
communion with Him, conceive of all Christians as 
showing, in every respect and always, a life and 
character and conduct definitely better than any 
other known apart from Him. That would be a 
witness indeed. The effect of such a testimony 
upon human society could not be measured. 

From such a Christianity, however, we seem at 
present, in spite of all the experiences of two mil- 
lenniums, to be tragically distant. Yet it is as sure 
as the truth of God and the nature of man, that 
nothing less than this will ever avail to establish the 
Kingdom of Heaven upon earth. This, therefore, 



286 WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 

and nothing less, is the main work and worth of the 
Christian Church. Nothing less broad, and deep, 
and noble, and tender, and practical, can ever ex- 
emplify that incarnation of the love of God in Jesus 
Christ towards humanity, unless which be true 
Christianity is but the world's greatest religious 
delusion. By such a test, then, not by numbers, 
not by social position, not by financial strength, not 
by national conventions, the Christian Church is to 
be tested. Apart from this, its work is but wasted 
energy, and its worth is nil. " If the salt have lost 
its savour, it is thenceforth good for nothing but to 
be cast out and trodden under foot of men." There 
can be little doubt that to just such a crucial testing 
as these words imply, Christianity is coming — or is 
come — as the twentieth century unfolds. How, in 
face of all the facts, any honest observer can be 
"incorrigibly optimistic," passes ordinary compre- 
hension. Prof. Eucken, who just now has the ear 
of the religious and philosophical world perhaps 
more than any other man save Bergson, has con- 
fessed that he takes a " pessimistic view of the 
future of the Churches as existing," whilst recog- 
nising the need for Christian fellowship and in- 
culcating a philosophy " essentially Christian ". J The 
inference is obvious. 

There is, however, one unmeasured comfort in 
face of the stupendous difficulties and undeniable 
failures suggested, viz. that the tiniest fraction of 
Christian reality counts as a contribution to the up- 
ward evolution contemplated. "The Kingdom of 
God," said Jesus, "comes not with observation." 
Not by convulsive throes, nor by revivalistic con- 
vulsions, but by gentle, slow yet steady growth, 

1 This conclusion is further embodied and amplified in his book- 
let " Konnen wir noch Christen sein ? " published by Veil & Co., 
Leipzig. 



WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 287 

will the Lord's Prayer be answered. Not "from 
above," as the current thoughtless phrase runs, 
but from round about, as well as from within, will 
any Millennium come. " The kingdom of God is in 
the very midst of you " x was the Master's reply to 
those who sought a sign from heaven. Not by 
great masses but in tiny grains, does that leaven work 
which is to transform earth's sins and shames and 
sorrows into love, and purity, and peace, and hope. 
If we may quote once more from so impartial a 
source, the close of Prof. Seeley's memorable chapter 
upon the " Enthusiasm of Humanity " gives in in- 
cisive summary an ideal which is not alone the hope 
of the future, but the unmeasured inspiration of every 
real disciple of Jesus Christ, however humble his 
sphere or humanly unknown his influence. 

11 Perhaps the truth is, that there has scarcely 
been a town in any Christian country since the 
time of Christ, where a century has passed 
without exhibiting a character of such elevation 
that his mere presence has shamed the bad and 
made the good better, and has been felt at times 
like the presence of God Himself. And if this 
be so, has Christ failed ? Or can Christianity 
die ? " 

To such a query, unbelief scarcely less than belief 
emphatically answers — No. But the very echo of 
that universal consent is the unmistakable assurance 
that without such witness as this, let come what else 
there may, the days of Christianity are numbered. 

3. The broadest and deepest sympathy. 
Although the Gospel of Christ necessarily begins 
with individual character, it is impossible that it 

1 Luke XVII. 20. For this, the true rendering, in spite of Tolstoi, 
see Internat. Crit. Commentary — Dr. Plummer. 



288 WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 

should end there. Conviction may grow in isolation, 
but character requires fellowship for its scope. Thus 
it comes to pass that the Christian ideal which the 
Churches have to embody, if they are to be worth 
perpetuating in human society, is as broadly practical 
as it is spiritually deep and high. True there are 
not a few Christian believers — whose sincerity need 
not be questioned— especially in the Evangelical 
Churches, whose only conception of Christian service 
is the " saving of souls ". To them, the only function 
of the Church is to " proclaim the Gospel". The 
work of all Christian Churches is to be purely 
" spiritual ". One of them wrote to the religious 
press just recently, to protest against a " Methodist 
Union for social service," on the alleged ground that 
— ■" Nothing but the grace of God is able to reach 
and to purify the hearts of men. None but Jesus 
can do helpless sinners good." Such sentiments 
are often as popular as they are pious. The ques- 
tion whether they are either true or sufficient, 
apparently does not occur to those who hold them. 
The typical sentence, for instance, here quoted, is 
simply untrue. It is not true that " nothing but the 
grace of God " can reach men's hearts. It is not 
true that "none but Jesus can do sinners good". 
For there are many influences that can reach men 
for their profit, and do sinners good, besides those 
included in the usual " spiritual " programme. Such 
mutilations of the whole mission of Christianity, are 
as contrary to the spirit and practice of Jesus Him- 
self, as to the teaching and example of the Apostles. 
"Whatsoever things are true " — to quote Paul once 
more — "take them all into account." Verily there 
are many and dreadful things that are only too true 
to-day, which are never contemplated in " revival " 
meetings, but which are quite as contrary to the 
will of God as any ordinary sins, or any of the evils 



WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 289 

against which both Christ and the Apostle so stren- 
uously protested in their day. Let us purposely take 
just a couple of brief summaries of modern facts from 
fair sources, not given to exaggeration. First, from 
the standpoint of religious conversatism : — 

"The poor of London have been thrust, and 
are kept by a Society which till lately called 
itself Christian, in conditions of life which make 
the preaching of the Gospel to them a mock- 
ery. They are practically denied their share in 
the Fatherhood of God, which for one thing 
promises to honest work enough of the neces- 
sities of life. They, however, are always 
1 anxious for the morrow ' with too good cause. 
They are forced to be dishonest, and impure, 
and cruel to one another. ... It is not in 
London alone, or in other great towns only, 
that men and women are forced to live like the 
beasts without the beasts' happy want of self- 
consciousness. 

" What, if we look at it sincerely, are the condi- 
tions of casual and underpaid labour, but slavery 
without its safeguards ? The acknowledged 
slave was often well treated, clothed and fed, 
and even maintained in his old age. The free 
workers, slaves of penury, have not even the 
value of a chattel. They are absolutely de- 
pendent on employers, who too often cannot 
afford to treat them well, being themselves 
also in bondage to the tyrant Competition. 
They cannot leave their miserable work, or if 
they do wander away it is only to find elsewhere 
conditions equally cruel and degrading. They 
have no claim on their masters, beyond a mini- 
mum payment for tasks actually done ; and 
when they fall, weary and worn out, only 

19 



290 WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 

destitution awaits them. Even the last and 
vilest reproach of the slave system is not done 
away. Virtue, honour, purity, are as hard to 
keep for thousands of free women as they ever 
were for the veriest ancient slave." l 

Or, from the standpoint of a man of science who 
could never be accused of sensationalism, let us listen 
to the deliberate judgement of the late Prof. 
Huxley : — 

"Anyone who is acquainted with the state of 
the population of all great industrial centres, is 
aware that amidst a large and increasing body 
of that population there reigns supreme that 
condition which the French call la misere — a 
word for which I do not think there is any exact 
English equivalent. It is a condition in which 
the food, warmth, clothing which are necessary 
for the mere maintenance of the functions of 
the body cannot be obtained ; in which men, 
women, and children are forced to crowd into 
dens where decency is abolished, and the most 
ordinary conditions of healthful existence are 
impossible of attainment ; the pleasures within 
reach are reduced to brutality and drunkenness ; 
the pains accumulate at compound interest in the 
shape of starvation, disease, stunted growth, 
and moral degradation ; the prospect of even 
steady and honest industry is often a life of 
unsuccessful battling with hunger, ended by a 
pauper's grave. I take it to be a mere plain 
truth that throughout industrial Europe there is 
not one single manufacturing city which is free 
from a vast mass of people whose condition is 
exactly that described, or from a still greater 
mass who, living just on the edge of the social 

1 "Bampton Lectures, 1907," pp. no, 112. 



WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 291 

swamp, are liable at any time to be precipitated 
into it." 

Again ; whatever views may be held in politics, 
the outspoken conviction of Mr. Jos. Chamberlain 
hereupon, will surely commend itself to every man 
who heeds religion : — 

" For my part, neither sneers, nor abuse, nor 
opposition, shall induce me to accept as the will 
of the Almighty and the unalterable dispensa- 
tion of His providence a state of things under 
which millions lead sordid, hopeless, monoton- 
ous lives, without pleasure in the present, and 
without prospect for the future." 

And is this a true picture in " Christian " England at 
the beginning of the twentieth century ? If such be 
the result of nineteen centuries of Christianity, is it 
any wonder that unbelief not only abounds but raises 
its voice in strongest protest ? But is such human 
misery due to Christianity ? Every honest mind 
knows that it is not. On the indicated scale, i.e. 
socially, commercially, politically, nationally, Christi- 
anity has never yet been tried. The ecclesiastical 
systems which in gorgeous apparel and all the 
swelling pomp of place and pride have masqueraded 
through the ages in the name of Christ's religion, 
have for the most part but disgraced it and contra- 
dicted Him. The comparatively few noble spirits 
at whose existence Seeley hints, have been the 
exceptions who have made lurid the rule. Only 
slowly, and through the travail of recent centuries, 
has the true Christ of the Gospels emerged from the 
welter of theological and ecclesiastical conflict. 
But if He be anything more than the myth into 
which some now seek to resolve Him, we know 
perfectly well what is His mind towards the human 
society, whether religious or irreligious, which is 



292 WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 

content that such abominations should continue as 
are but faintly outlined in the above quotations. 
What then, we are driven to ask again, are Churches 
for, if not to interpret His mind to the world — even 
though it should necessitate a modern setting of the 
twenty-third chapter of Matthew's Gospel ? Modern 
populations are surely warranted in inquiring what 
is the worth of the Christian Church — irrespective of 
name or sect — if not to bring into actual potent exer- 
cise all those principles which are as plain as the 
light of day, when any real regard is paid to the 
sympathy of Jesus and the mind of God as the 
Heavenly Father of all men. 

It is verily an easy matter for fluent speakers at 
Anglican or Free Church conferences, to secure ap- 
plause through declaiming that we must "stop the 
tap by reforming individual character ". It is on a 
par with the well-intended but hackneyed and short- 
sighted avowal, that if only men's souls are saved, 
and they are genuinely " converted," all else that is 
desirable will follow. Again it is not true. It 
neither faces the facts before such conversion, nor 
the difficulties after. Such sentiments, however 
pleasing to a well-dressed, well-fed audience, already 
comfortably provided with homes and incomes, in- 
volve tragedies of hindrance, if not impossibility, on 
the plane of the daily life of myriads in our congested 
cities and forgotten villages. It is as if some less 
sensible and sympathetic "good Samaritan," stoop- 
ing over the victim of cruel violence, had bidden him 
get up and go home. Whereas from the ground he 
might truly reply, that he could not get up because 
his leg was broken ; and that he could not go home 
because he had no home. That would be substanti- 
ally true to-day of thousands who are as morally 
innocent as any assembly of clergymen, and are 
much more unjustly treated. "Give ye them to 



WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 293 

eat," said Jesus, when many modern Evangelicals 
would have simply suggested an inquiry meeting. 
Of a truth unless there be something more than the 
provision of shelters, and soup kitchens, and labour 
yards, even the most strenuous facing of what are 
called " social problems" — which are at bottom 
always social wrongs and therefore moral matters, 
coming necessarily into the programme of Christian 
ethics — the condition of millions in this incredibly 
wealthy country will go on to be far worse than that 
of the hungry crowd which elicited the compassion 
of Jesus, or the half-murdered victim who so sadly 
needed a " neighbour ". For which reason it is quite 
as much the spiritual work of the Churches to help on 
social reform, as it is to labour for the conversion of 
souls. The old fiction that it is the preacher's work 
to preach " as a dying man to dying men," should 
be buried for evermore. Rather is it his privilege 
and duty, as a living man addressing living men, to 
assure them in His Master's name of the unmeasured 
sympathy of God, and call upon the Churches to 
prove it in practical service of every kind. There 
is no more contradiction between the spiritual and 
the social in the work of the Christian Church, than 
between the two hands of a good workman. "This 
ought ye to have done," Jesus said, "and not to 
leave the other undone." If ever such words found 
application in human affairs, they do so now, in 
regard to what are sometimes distinguished as the 
spiritual and social duties of the Church. There is 
no such distinction in the New Testament. The 
Church that does not, according to its ability, do 
both, does neither. The spirituality which exhausts 
itself in private emotions, or Sunday raptures, or 
meetings for esoteric fellowship, does not merit the 
name. Even as Socialism, or any other scheme for 
social reform, is alike unworthy and impossible, 



294 WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 

without the new heart of love upon which Christian 
spirituality puts prime emphasis. 

Is it then, one may ask, the duty of the Christian 
Church to initiate and carry through a definite social 
programme, or political campaign ? And the plain 
answer is — Certainly not. No such consequence 
flows from the recognition of the all-comprehending 
sympathy of the Christ spirit. Jesus Himself was 
neither politician nor Socialist, in the technical sense 
which those words have now acquired. But he was 
both, when their deeper significance is recognized. 
For the ultimate aim of the principles which He in- 
culcated can only be truthfully described as the 
greatest blessing of the greatest number. Whence 
it comes to pass that the Church which really acts 
upon His commands, has more to do with the total 
welfare of mankind than any other corporate bod} 7 
of men on earth ; and has a function to discharge 
which is quite unique and inimitable. Its unlimited 
concern for the utmost well-being of humanity can- 
not but follow from its acknowledgment of the 
dignity of man's nature as a moral being ; from its 
belief in the Fatherhood of God, with the consequent 
brotherhood of men ; from its acceptance of Christ's 
ideal of a Kingdom of Heaven on earth with justice, 
peace, and gladness, for all mankind ; from its 
assurance that there is a nobler life to come for 
which each should have full chance of training here. 
In view of such a nature, such capacity, such destiny , 
the oppressions and wrongs, the cruelties and de- 
gradations of civilization, become correspondingly 
more monstrous and intolerable than they can pos- 
sibly be on any other estimate. The very fact, more- 
over, that Christ and His Apostles inculcated no 
political or social programme, makes it possible for 
the Christian Church to adapt itself to the environ- 
ment of any age. It is, therefore, entirely without 



WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 295 

excuse if it does not exercise its utmost influence 
in all directions, towards bringing to pass the highest 
good for every child of man. 

Whether a Christian man — or Church — regards 
Collectivism as the best social theory or not, must 
be left to his own judgement. But just as the First 
Great Command binds him also to the Second, so 
does the Second bind him to find some method which 
shall be the best that he can conceive, for fulfilling 
its behest in becoming " neighbour," as Christ in- 
terpreted it, to his fellow-man in need. 

Most of the great social evils of our day are so 
deep-rooted in human nature's evil tendencies, and 
complicated by mighty vested interests and obstinate 
old customs, as well as downright sins against light 
and love, that the radically corrective measures 
which alone can cure them, must proceed slowly. 
Evolution, not revolution, is the only way of regener- 
ation for human society. But a very wide field of 
service opens out for the Christian Church, in present 
practical sympathy with the sinful and suffering and 
needy. To refer to this as " merely palliative," is 
but prejudiced mockery. Even if the very best 
schemes for social reconstruction that the ablest 
men can devise, were to be urged on by the most 
unselfish Christian devotion emanating from all the 
Churches united, yet time is required, when all the 
innumerable complications and hindrances are con- 
sidered. It is all too plain that a long time must 
elapse before anything like a social Millennium can 
be attained. Whilst, then, society is being recon- 
structed, what is to become of the individual men 
and women and children who now actually consti- 
tute the sad host of the " submerged tenth," and the 
"yet greater mass " of whom Prof. Huxley spoke ? 

Whatever may be done by amended Poor Laws, 
or by private charity, the answer for Christian 



296 WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 

Churches is that besides being depositories of truth 
and schools of character, they must also be — each 
according to its own environment — a refuge, a hos- 
pital, a home, for all who are weary and heavy 
laden, whether they are suffering through sin, or 
crushed in the ruthless modern struggle. In these 
respects, the record of the Churches is happily cheer- 
ing, and present-day facts are inspiring. For be the 
faults of the Christian Church what they may, as a 
spiritual institution, it is in this practical regard not 
only without reproach, but without parallel. The 
Christian Churches of this land are even now doing 
in one week — in actual relief of the needy, comfort 
of the distressed, feeding of the hungry, support of 
the weak, rescue of the fallen, etc. — more than all 
unbelief, as such, has done in all its history. The 
innumerable philanthropic activities of the great 
Missions now established in almost all our large 
cities, are not merely unprecedented in history, but 
fraught with incalculable results of help and bless- 
ing. There are very few Churches indeed which 
have not an honourable share in such a genuine 
" service of man V The only real failure here from 

1 Of all the flippant falsities served up for popular anti-Christian 
consumption by the cheap press of to-day, perhaps none are more 
conspicuous than these : " Christianity concerns itself with God and 
man, putting God first and man last." " The Christian religion 
divides its sendees between man and God." " Christians give a great 
deal more attention to God than to man " (" God and My Neighbour,'' 
p. 190). A child's knowledge of the New Testament suffices to 
answer such gibes. And yet if we must be honest, such misrepre- 
sentation is no worse than that which sometimes emanates from 
Christian sources. Just recently, for instance, Dr. Inge, as Dean of 
St. Paul's, in a lecture on " The co-operation of the Church with the 
spirit of the age," has had the hardihood to declare in public that 
" Socialism always assumes that it was the sty that made the pig, 
whilst Christianity declared that the pig made the sty ". Here the 
falsity of the assertion in regard to Socialism, is only equalled by un- 
warranted attribution to Christianity of cold-blooded indifference to 



WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 297 

the truly Christian ideal, is that in every Church 
such good Samaritan work is done by the few. 
The many only do it by proxy. Hence, neither the 
quantity nor the quality of the Church's mission of 
compassion is what it ought to be, might be, and 
would be, if all who are called Christians were true 
to their avowed principles. The little we can here 
point out on this great theme cannot better close 
than with a couple of sentences more from the 
Bampton Lectures already so often quoted. 

" If all the men and women who call them- 
selves Christians could simply do the good they 
know, and eschew the evil they know, for 
Christ's sake, the aspect of social and economic 
problems would be so changed that we have no 
right to suppose that they would remain in- 
soluble. . . . But that we may be fit to take our 
part there is one thing needful ; if we are to 
help at all in making the world Christian we 
must first be really Christians ourselves ; and 
I fear there is no doubt that for most of us, 
for all except a very few, that means we must 
become Christians." 

4. The largest hope. 

But whatever the politician and social reformer 
may do, neither human nature nor the Christian 

heredity and environment. And then dignitaries of the Church — all 
in comfortable circumstances — wonder why the " masses " do not 
attend public worship. Are they likely to be moved in that direction 
by this Anglican clergyman's further sneer at " that rather tortuous 
and greasy instrument of party politics, the Nonconformist con- 
science " ? When one remembers how that name arose, and what 
principles in modern social life have been maintained under its 
auspices, the spectacle of a Christian teacher publicly jeering at it, 
smites one with despair. Surely of all philosophies ever presented to 
the human mind, Christianity has most reason to cry " Save me from 
my friends ! " (Surely the term " greasy " above, must be a re- 
porter's error.) 



298 WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 

Church can end here. Human life we know well 
is in itself, at best and longest, but infinitesimal. 
Yet is each individual consciousness so unique, so 
unfathomable, so precious to its possessor, that the 
question of the ages is to-day as real and as insistent 
as ever — does death end all ? What is to be the 
ultimate result of all our anxiety, and effort, and 
conflict, in this transitory condition of being? If 
a man die, shall he live again ? Or shall he be no 
more than a mere clutcher of this life's iridescent 
bubbles ? Must we accept those counsels of despair 
concerning "thanatism," which have so recently 
passed beyond the stage of agnostic submission to 
fate into bald denial of any higher hope and coarse 
insult to every nobler instinct ? Modern Haeckelian 
Monism informs us, in strident tones, not only that 
at death our whole being becomes extinct, but that 
we ought to be grateful for being delivered from 
" the menace " of personal immortality ! The Chris- 
tian Church, at all events, will not hesitate to reply 
that such " thanatism " is no less impertinent in face 
of modern psychological developments, than it is 
ruled out of thought by all the sanctions of the 
Gospel of Christ. As Christians we listen to such 
dogmatic dicta of godless science and anti-Christian 
philosophy as we do to the wanderings of the de- 
mented, or the ravings of a demagogue, with pity 
but without fear. 

In the light of true science, normal self-conscious- 
ness joins with Christian belief to endorse the pro- 
tests of our noblest poets. Bearing in mind what 
has already been advanced on this theme in preced- 
ing sections, there is only need here to point out that 
in this respect the Christian Churches hold a commis- 
sion distinct from and beyond every other religion or 
philosophy on earth. " I am come " — said the Christ 
of the Gospels — "that they may have life, and may 



WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 299 

have it abundantly." Death can no more put a 
limit to that "abundantly," than the glass of our 
windows prevent the light from entering. It is true 
that none of His words make any attempt to express 
that future life in terms of this. Our curiosity, be 
it ever so reverent, or tender, or scientific, remains 
ungratified. But the Christian hope is none the less 
sure and steadfast. It is as unmistakable as inde- 
finable. As the truth concerning God and moral 
freedom is absolutely essential to the highest value 
and noblest possibilities of this life, so is the assur- 
ance of immortality, to which also the Christian 
Church bears witness, equally necessary, if all the 
past and present together are to be anything more 
than a cruelly mocking fiasco. No truer word has 
ever been uttered than the Apostle's avowal — " By 
hope are we saved ". 

For such a hope beyond the grave, human nature 
has ever groped in a myriad pathetic ways ; from 
the Book of the Dead in ancient Egypt, to the eager 
Spiritism and earnest Psychical Research of our 
own day. But all that is worth holding in the 
religions of the past, or the occult philosophies of 
the present, is included in the promise of the Gospel 
of Jesus for which the Churches stand. Not that 
their witness is even yet as worthy as it might be. 
They have much to unlearn as well as to learn 
herein. But in spite of all the hindrances of con- 
. ventional notions and popular theology, the vision 
of the future has wonderfully cleared during the last 
half century. And the blessed hope which it is 
equally the privilege and duty of the Churches to 
make known, is less and less obscured by narrow 
and foolish literalisms on the brighter side, or by 
ghastly and repulsive realism on the darker. 

Such a hope, unmarred by childishness, for all who 
love the light, and such warning, untainted with 



3oo WHAT ARE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 

malignity, for those who prefer moral darkness, were 
never so much needed as now. The more valuable 
life becomes to all our fellow-men, through social 
regeneration which shall give to every one a fair 
opportunity to enjoy and make good use of it, the 
more utterly inadequate become all the schemes and 
systems which have absolutely nothing to promise 
at its close but a coffin, or cremation. All the fine 
speech about joining "the choir invisible," or being 
"resorbed once more into the great Over-Soul," is 
to the human heart but as the mocking mirage of the 
desert to the despairing traveller. There is nothing 
in it but self-delusion. In plain prose it amounts to 
a promise that, one day, / shall cease to be. Which 
is exactly, as Huxley felt, what the present normal, 
healthy, "I," most of all deprecates. The wider 
range of the human intellect, the quickened sensi- 
tiveness of nature associated with higher education, 
the growing pressure of social problems, and the 
utter inexplicableness of many of life's individual 
mysteries of pain, all combine to make a reliable 
hope concerning the hereafter something which in 
very deed men "cannot do without". From the 
barren outlook of annihilation which could not but 
depress all who have made life worth living, as well 
as from the hopeless heartache which would crush 
us concerning loved ones for ever lost, the Gospel 
of Jesus comes to save all the children of fear and 
sorrow. 

In wise and earnest faithfulness to such a com- 
mission of hope, the Christian Church confirms and 
crowns all other reasons men may have for believing 
that death does not end all. The past mistakes of 
eschatology may all be conceded — to quote Prof. 
Seeley again — "without conceding for a moment 
that the world can do without Christ and His church " 
— as regards the life to come. He is the risen Lord 



WORTH TO THE MODERN WORLD? 301 

of life — the eternal proof that "life shall live for 
evermore ". Never was water more welcome to 
the thirst-worn traveller than His assuring words 
of comfort and hope to troubled minds and sorrow- 
ing hearts. What human nature craves above all 
else in regard to the mystery beyond the grave, is 
a worthy and reliable hope. This it is the high 
privilege of the Christian Church to give mankind, 
in never-ceasing reiteration of its Master's words — 
" Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be 
afraid. Believe in God; believe also in Me." 

Here then, finally, we find the fourfold function 
of the Catholic Church of Christ, which cannot but 
justify itself to men in proportion as it is faithfully 
fulfilled. Amidst all the rush and crush of our 
modern life, in the very thick of its conflicting 
interests and excitements, in spite of all the most 
cynical as well as honest criticism, in face of the 
whole crowd of oppositions alike from most refined 
and coarsest quarters, Christian Churches stand for 
the earnest teaching of the highest truths ; for the 
development of the very noblest character; for 
the measureless and universal application of the 
brotherly sympathy which should issue from such 
character ; and for the blessed assurance of a worthy 
and valid hope when the whole death-ending human 
episode shall have passed away. 

Such a commission transcends all the claims of 
science, the delights of art, the fascinations of litera- 
ture, the advantages of commerce, and the demands 
of sociology. All that is required in order to mani- 
fest its inestimable value to humanity, is that the 
Churches should be faithful to it. This resolves 
itself, manifestly, into the question which must here 
be left to every believer's own conscience — If such 
be the worth of the Church to the world, what am 



302 WHAT ARE CHURCHES WORTH? 

I worth to the Church ? The great principle which 
just now needs to be made clear above all else, is 
that whilst the world of mankind needs such a King- 
dom of Heaven as is here betokened more and more 
every generation, its coming is not waiting for God, 
but for men and women after God's own heart. It 
is not waiting for theologies, or conventions, or con- 
ferences, or revivals, but for the average man and 
woman, who, bearing Christ's name, is also His 
faithful witness. The dignity and value which such 
an opportunity puts upon even the humblest life, as 
well as the responsibility resting upon the richly 
endowed, are simply immeasurable. What are 
money, and civic position, and political influence, 
and worldly sensationalism, compared with the in- 
spiring assurance that one's life is actually spreading 
sweetness and light, truth and goodness, sympathy 
and hope, amongst one's fellows? And assuredly 
when the call which admits of no refusal comes, 
bidding each let go everything here that seems now 
so precious, what other hope or comfort will be 
worth mention beside the whisper of the voice 
Divine — " Well done, good and faithful servant, enter 
thou into the joy of thy Lord " ? 



WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST NEEDED 
IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 



"The relative impotence of the Church in contemporary society is 
deeply to be regretted. No lover of Christianity can let it persist without 
protest. The sacrosanct manner in the pulpit and in the pew, coupled 
with the tyranny of traditional views, and the staleness of conventional 
language, have in no small measure brought it to pass that the Church 
is to-day suffering in her comparative powerlessness a punishment which 
should have been visited only upon sheer insincerity." 

— W. F. Osborne, " The Faith of a Layman ". 

" It is useless to evoke the fine faculty of faith unless we can also pro- 
vide for it a solid base in reason. Emotional conversions must always 
be liable to contrary gusts of feeling, and subject to that law of instability 
which governs all emotion. It is only when we unite emotions with 
thorough intellectual conviction that we reach an impregnable foundation 
for the Christian life. Hence I have striven during my whole ministry 
to obtain the entire assent of the mind as well as of the heart, to the 
Masterhood of Jesus Christ in human life." 

— W. J. Dawson, " The Divine Challenge". 

" Facile belief is of but little value ; it often only means that as certain 
words make no impression whatever upon the mind, so they excite no 
opposition in it. There are few things which Christ would have visited 
with sterner censure, than that short-cut to belief which consists of 
abandonment of mental effort." 

— Sir Oliver Lodge, Pref. to " Ecce Homo ". 

" To attempt to bar out criticism by affirming inspiration, is a futile 
enterprise. The day for that is past. You cannot now do it. Men will 
for themselves inquire, and will test the accuracy of the Gospels because 
they are resolved to know the truth. For let us make no mistake; the 
freest inquiry is the only possible path to sound conviction. God's world 
is a world of progress, the tide is now flowing, and he who stiffly clings to 
his old moorings will inevitably be swamped." 

— Dr. Marcus Dods, " The Bible: its Nature and Origin". 

" If any new principle is to gain power in human history, it must take 
shape and life in individuals who have faith in it. The men of faith are 
the living spirits, the channels by which new truth and power from God 
enter into humanity. The fundamental contribution of every man is the 
change of his personality. The ministry in particular must apply the 
teaching functions of the pulpit to the pressing questions of public moral- 
ity. They must lift social questions to a religious level by faith and 
spiritual insight. The larger the number of ministers who attempt these 
untrodden ways, the safer and saner will be those who follow." 

— Prof. Rauschenbusch, " Christianity and the Social Crisis". 



305 



CHAPTER X 

WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST NEEDED 
IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 

No thoughtful Christian can possibly be satisfied 
with the present condition and apparent prospect of 
Christianity. He may be far removed from pessim- 
ism, or even depression, and may cultivate cheerful- 
ness by reason of the immeasurable amount of 
unquestionable good existing and growing in every 
section of the Catholic Church. He knows how, 
when every Church is viewed from the inside, there 
is ever more than enough to set off against cynical 
criticisms from the outside. Viewed in itself, and 
compared with generations past, Christianity has 
every reason to thank God and take courage. There 
are to-day more Christians than ever before ; their 
whole spirit and demeanour, taken as a whole, is 
worthier than ever, and nearer to the mind of Christ 
as portrayed in the New Testament ; Christian theo- 
logy is being purified and enlarged ; Christian philan- 
thropy at home is broader and more practical ; zeal 
for missions in other lands has developed to an un- 
precedented extent ; Sunday schools are being over- 
hauled and improved in every respect ; new and 
costly buildings are springing up everywhere, fitted 
with all modern appliances and conveniences ; whilst 
by the confession of one of their bitterest opponents 
the Churches have " the unswerving trust and con- 
fidence of millions of honest and worthy citizens ". 
This being but an imperfect summary of what might 
truthfully be stated hereupon, Christian believers 

20 



3o6 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST 

can afford to smile at the offers so often made by 
unbelievers, to ring the curfew bell for Christianity. 
If, indeed, it were necessary to seek volunteers to 
ring the knell of the Christian faith, no doubt many 
would be eagerly ready to oblige. But their services 
are not required. They are, as a matter of fact, less 
likely to be called for than ever. Prof. Seeley's 
famous question " Has Christ failed, or can Chris- 
tianity die ? " meets with a negative reply which is 
growing in force with every succeeding generation. 
The many diversities of conviction, differences in 
ritual, varieties of Church government, conflicts 
about new theology, struggles for educational rights 
and opportunities, however sometimes regrettable, 
are yet signs of life, not death. They indicate vitality, 
not decay. Whatever may sometimes be lament- 
able in their developments, at least they are like 
volcanic eruptions in pointing to unmeasured energy, 
they are proofs of a latent power which provokes fear 
even when it does not win approval. Those eager 
modern spirits, therefore, who are so anxious to 
assist at the obsequies of all the Christian Churches, 
would be well advised to look for some more promis- 
ing occupation. Christianity, in a word, was never 
less likely to come to an end, than it is as we advance 
into the present century. 

Having said this much, and said it deliberately, 
the way is open, without affording any sensible 
reason for flinging about charges of " pessimism" 
or "alarmism " or " depression," to consider franfcly 
the other side. For there are, to any instructed 
Christian mind, quite as real reasons for anxiety in 
these days, as for thankfulness. Even if, regarded 
absolutely, Christianity is a greater success than 
ever, it is no less true that, regarded relatively, it is 
a greater failure than ever. What, for instance, is 
the meaning of this title to the series of lectures 



NEEDED IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 307 

above-mentioned, delivered, as already indicated, at 
St. Mary's, Oxford, by a devoted clergyman, in the 
very midst of the strongest associations of conser- 
vative ecclesiasticism ? — 

"The Reproach of the Gospel — an inquiry into 
the apparent failure of Christianity as a rule of 
life and conduct, with special reference to the 
present time." 

If such an estimate came from some well-known 
quarters where everything Christian is execrated, 
it would be easily comprehensible. But one is driven 
to fear that there must be some grave causes for 
anxiety, when such avowals and such confessions 
come openly from out of the very heart of the Chris- 
tian Church. 

The fear indicated is only too well grounded in 
facts. Reasons for " reproach " in connexion with 
the Christian Gospel, even in modern England, are 
indeed not far to seek. They may be stated with 
a brevity which is sufficiently significant without 
elaboration. In spite of all the wealth and influence 
as well as unceasing devotion represented by the 
Churches, there can be no doubt that, to a very real 
extent, Christian progress is arrested. In all the 
Free Churches membership shows persistent de- 
crease when there should be large increase. In the 
Anglican Church membership is not tabulated, but 
in all its services there is a marked and increasing 
absence of men ; whilst speaking for all the Churches 
and the whole country, public worship is more and 
more ignored by the modern population. The new 
buildings which are continually being erected in 
the suburbs are very far from being filled with wor- 
shippers. Also, they almost always represent an 
older, and generally larger, forsaken building in the 
centre of the city. Although large numbers are 



308 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST 

gathered together weekly in most of our great cities, 
in spacious Mission Halls under the auspices of 
Wesleyan Methodism, the main plain fact remains 
that four-fifths of the adult population of this most 
Christian country in the world, are entirely outside 
the Churches, and for the most part content to be so. 

Out of the seven millions of human beings now 
belonging to London, it is carefully computed that 
less than one million are in any way connected with 
the Christian Church. The proportion of the " work- 
ing classes " in all the other large city centres, who 
treat the Christian faith as entirely a matter of 
option, or a middle-class luxury, is undoubtedly the 
same. Social unrest is a commonplace of the hour. 
It is not more actual than timely. The conditions 
under which vast numbers of our fellow-citizens 
have to live, are simply an abomination in the sight 
of God and man. But men who are rightly most 
restless in claiming justice rather than charity, have 
come to feel that Christian Churches, as a whole, 
have shown them little practical sympathy in their 
conflict. Their natural inference is that in contend- 
ing for what is due to them, and struggling for 
opportunity to make this life worth living, the 
Gospel of Christ as presented by organized Churches 
is of little or no service to them. Consequently, 
religion forms no part of their programme, and 
Christian sanctions are to them much the same as 
museum curiosities. 

Meanwhile, the modern atmosphere, intellectually, 
scientifically, philosophically, is, at the very least, not 
calculated to help to fill the churches. True, the 
crass materialism of the last half of the nineteenth 
century has spent itself, and a spiritual monism 
much nearer to Christian philosophy is at present in 
vogue. But it is far removed from the assumptions 
of ordinary Christian teaching. The three great 



NEEDED IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 309 

postulates of Christian belief, God, freedom, and 
immortality, are more openly challenged than ever 
before. When philosophers of the calibre of Dr. Jas. 
Ward frankly follow Kant in declaring " the futility 
of the ontological, the teleological, the cosmological 
proofs of the existence of a God " — those who have 
eyes will see what influences are operating on the 
better educated in these respects. But this is a day 
above all of cheap printing and publishing ; and of 
this fact unbelief has taken definitely fuller advantage 
than belief. Thanks to sixpenny reprints, and penny, 
or halfpenny journalism, the so-called "determin- 
ism " — which is fathered by the Hegelian Professor 
at Cambridge, not to mention others — is spiced up 
afresh and scattered broadcast at popular prices, so 
that the man in the street is emphatically assured 
that thanks to heredity and environment, he cannot 
help anything he does, and therefore may cast moral 
responsibility to the winds. 1 There is then, of 
course, " no such thing as sin," and " Christianity is 
a tissue of absurdities built upon a foundation of 
errors " Immortality thus becomes nothing more 
than a pious fantasy, no more deserving serious 
thought than a midsummer night's dream. The 
extent to which these uncompromising and con- 
temptuous dismissals of everything Christian have 
been diffused during the last quarter of a century, is 
greatly underrated by the Churches. They have in 
this regard for the most part played the policy of 
the ostrich — with the natural results. Those who 
are willing to face the actual facts, know well that 
it is not social unrest alone but also intellectual and 
theological unrest, which is working with ever in- 

1 For detailed proof of this, see the writer's " Guilty," a reply 
to " Not Guilty," by Mr. R. Blatchford, and " Determinism— False 
and True " (C. Kelly). 



310 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST 

creasing force in the opposite direction to Christian 
faith and worship. 

Mention has also to be made of the undeniable 
development of the popular craving for amusements, 
whether in the shape of Theatres for the well-to-do, 
or Picture Palaces for the poor, along with the foot- 
ball craze — it cannot truthfully be called anything 
else — which fills numberless columns in all the news- 
papers of the land. It must not, however, be for- 
gotten that this whole hanker for amusement has a 
pitiful side to it. To an unmeasured extent it repre- 
sents reaction from the ruthless fight of modern 
industrial conditions. Prof. Huxley said only too 
truly that, in myriads of cases of men and women 
who fill our congested cities, "the only pleasures 
within reach are brutality and drunkenness ". If 
cheap music halls and picture shows make some- 
thing even a little better than these possible, they 
are not wholly evils. There can be no honest 
doubt that the weary, dreary, hopeless monotony 
of much daily toil, and the prolonged hours of labour 
which competition in many trades makes inevitable, 
leave the human beings who are to-day's white 
slaves physically exhausted. In such condition they 
are little disposed, either in body or mind, to attend 
to religious matters, or appreciate the call to 
character-building which Christianity makes upon 
them. 

All these items thus briefly enumerated are not 
merely true, but operative in our midst as never 
before in human history. When to their definitely 
anti-Christian influence is added the action, within 
the pale of the Churches, of those irresistible and 
unsettling forces which are known as the Higher 
Criticism, Mythological research, Comparative re- 
ligion, and the New Theology, the seriousness of 
the outlook from the standpoint of Evangelical re- 



NEEDED IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 311 

ligion is too manifest to need comment. The general 
acceptance, moreover, of the principle of evolution 
on the part of Christian teachers, 1 has brought as 
real difficulties in some directions as relief in others. 
The frontal attacks of nineteenth century material- 
ism, after all, were less dangerous to Christian beliefs 
than the insidious flank movements of Naturalism 
and Agnosticism. The giving up of special creation 
leaves us yet, as Mr. Mallock has truly said, in pre- 
sence of the "crux of theism," when the relations 
between evolution and individual men and women 
are fairly faced. 

Enough, however, has here been intimated to 
confirm the truth of the opening sentence of this 
section. It is not pessimism, therefore, but wisdom 
and honesty combined, which bid us, as Christians, 
ask what are we to be, or to do, in response to such 
unmistakable signs of the times ? In reply, it is 
generally affirmed that what is wanted is a "real 
revival of religion ". But that phrase may mean 
something or nothing, genuine Christian devotion 
or fanatic folly, according to its interpretation. The 
term " revival " may, indeed, be permitted, as being 
both common and suggestive. But if it is to be at 
all applicable to the modern situation, it must con- 

1 Though this is by no means always the case. A book already 
mentioned which has passed through several editions, and reached a 
circulation of 50,000, roundly declares, in the name of the only true 
Christianity, that " The operation of the law of evolution is rigidly 
limited to the circle of the activities of the descendants of Adam. 
Within that circle everything without exception is subject to evolu- 
tionary changes. Outside of it there is not a trace of such changes " 
(" The World and its God," by P. Mauro). Of course the only 
serious feature of such printing as this, is that numbers of unin- 
structed religious people will both read and believe it, and then re- 
present Christianity on such lines to the average artisan. Meanwhile 
he is being continually better informed, and so will reject at once 
and altogether the Christianity which is pledged to such dogmatic 
falsity. 



312 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST 

note much more than is generally understood by 
it. Five main features, at least, have to be distinctly 
recognized, if such a suggested remedy is to meet 
the Christian need of this generation. 

i. The first of these is to the effect that any re- 
vival of religion which is to be real and effective 
to-day must be comprehensive. Revivalism, as or- 
dinarily understood, means emotionalism, and in not 
a few cases little more. In the best instances certainly 
the stirred emotion may be said to be dynamic, and 
may bring to pass moral decisions and changes which 
long remain in force. How far each of these possi- 
bilities actually accompanied the much-discussed 
recent " revival " in Wales, need not here be decided. 
The point is that, even taken at its best, the Welsh 
revival is not the true type of what is needed by 
modern Christianity. It is not nearly comprehensive 
enough. There is no need whatever to underrate 
the good accomplished when the spiritual fervour 
of the Church is quickened ; when backsliders are 
brought once more into the fold ; when superficial 
hearers are led to conviction ; when drunkards, 
thieves, wife-beaters, and all such, are transformed 
into worthy characters. But all these results, esti- 
mated at their highest and utmost, represent but a 
portion of the significance of Christianity for this 
age, and consequent mission of Christian Churches. 
"You have nothing to do but to save souls," said 
John Wesley to his early helpers. But that ideal, 
taken in crass literalness, would be as false to the 
Gospel of Jesus as it may be true when comprehen- 
sively interpreted. Such a phrase as "soul-saving," 
we know, was never on the lips of Jesus Himself. 
Nor did the Apostles ever use it in any such narrow, 
or pietistic, or future sense as would ignore the 
practical breadth of their Master's own statement 



NEEDED IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 313 

of His mission. When He declared to the eager 
crowd in the synagogue at Nazareth — "To-day is 
this Scripture fulfilled in your hearing," it was after 
reading to them one of the most comprehensive of 
the utterances of Isaiah : — 

The spirit of the Lord is upon me, 

Because He has anointed me to proclaim good news to 

the poor, 
He has sent me to proclaim release to captives, 
And recovery of sight to the blind, 
To set at liberty those whom tyranny has crushed, 
To proclaim the year of acceptance with the Lord. 

And that this was no mere passing vision, is wit- 
nessed by all His other teaching which is so vividly 
summarized by Matthew's record, when it claims on 
His behalf that He also fulfilled other glowing words 
of the same prophet : — 

This is my Servant whom I have chosen, 

My Beloved in whom my soul delights ; 

I will breathe my spirit upon him, 

And he will announce justice to the nations. 

He will not wrangle nor cry aloud, 

Nor will his voice be heard in the streets. 

A crushed reed will he not break, 

Nor will he quench the smouldering wick, 

Until he has led on justice to victory. 

And on his name shall the nations rest their hopes. 

One cannot doubt that it was with full knowledge 
of such a claim on His Master's behalf, that the 
Apostle Paul wrote so emphatically, in the midst of 
his plea for breadth of charity, 1 that " The kingdom 
of God does not consist of eating and drinking, but 
of right conduct and peace and joy, through the 
Holy Spirit ". 

Can it be questioned that the lack of this practical 
and social breadth, the sincere but mistaken narrow- 
ing of Christian faith to " purely spiritual " matters, 

1 Rom. xiv. 



314 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST 

has been and is one of the main causes of the gener- 
ally acknowledged defection from the Churches at 
the present time ? Dean Moore Ede certainly put 
the case as trenchantly as truly, in his valuable 
Hulsean Lectures for 1895 : — 

" The great complaint of the masses is that 
the Church is so taken up with the concerns of 
the world to come, and with theological doctrines 
and ritual, that it is of little use in helping to 
make this world brighter and better. This is 
one great reason for their alienation from the 
Church. If we be honest, we must admit there 
is some justice in the complaint. Christ re- 
vealed God, but in that revelation He laid very 
little stress on the mystery of the Godhead ; He 
laid great stress on the brotherly relations which 
should exist among men as a consequence of 
belief in the Fatherhood of God. The Church 
has said a great deal about the mystery of the 
Godhead, and comparatively little about mani- 
festing a brotherly spirit in all our dealings with 
our fellow-men. It is much easier to be in- 
terested in speculative views as to the nature of 
Deity, much easier to observe forms of devotion, 
much easier to give money or build Churches, 
than to manifest love to our fellows in the acts 
of daily life, in buying, selling, and getting gain. 
The Pharisees of old made long prayers and 
then defrauded widows. There is too much 
truth in the saying that in our day, men are 
willing to offer their prayers and praise on 
Sunday, if on Monday they may go into the 
market place and skin their fellows and sell 
their hides." 1 

1 " The Church and Town Problems," pp. 21-23. 



NEEDED IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 315 

Hence the ordinary " revival of religion " is good 
so far as it goes, but does not go far enough. It is 
individual, spiritual, corrective. This is unquestion- 
ably a good and necessary beginning, even as the 
beginning of life is necessarily birth, and the re- 
newal of life after disease is necessarily bodily 
health. But life is more than birth, and renewed 
health means resumed work of all kinds. So if the 
Kingdom of Heaven is ever to come on earth, there 
will have to be not only the individual, spiritual, 
corrective element, in renewed religious lives, but 
also the practical, social, educative element in equal 
measure, extending in all directions. The prayer 
so often on the lips of worshipping congregations, 
needs to be very much more in their heads and 
hearts. "Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done 
on earth, as it is in heaven " covers a vast deal 
more than the return of prodigals, or the sobering 
of drunkards, or the addition of members to Churches. 
It can never mean less than the development of 
all Church members in the principles of Christian 
altruism. It is very well to recite often in a public 
liturgy, that — "When the wicked man turneth away 
from the wickedness that he hath committed, and 
doeth that which is lawful and right, he shall 
save his soul alive ". But it is to be feared that 
the words are little thought about. Or else the ques- 
tion would demand answer — what then ? When 
he has so far " saved his soul alive," what is it 
but the call to service ? How can it mean other 
than both duty and opportunity to obey the command 
"Go and do thou likewise," and play the good 
Samaritan to all who need such help. The miseries 
brought about in modern civilization by evil heredity 
and environment, are much more terrible than the 
robbery of a traveller on the road to Jericho. The 
need of counteracting their dire influence and turn- 



316 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST 

ing it into good, comes quite as necessarily into the 
programme of religious revival, as the building of 
churches or Mission halls into that of Christian 
work. The frightfully anti-Christian, immoral, de- 
grading influence of very much modern environ- 
ment, can only be ignored by those who are wilfully 
blind or selfishly indifferent. The lesson on which 
the Churches lay such stress, viz. that character can 
greatly influence and even triumph over environ- 
ment, is true indeed. But it is not more true than 
the converse ; viz. the influence of environment upon 
character. We may not forget the impressive words 
of our earnest Bampton Lecturer above referred to, 
that— 

" The poor of London have been thrust and 
are kept by a society which till lately called 
itself Christian, into conditions of life which 
make the preaching of the Gospel to them a 
mockery. — It is the moral degradation, the 
spiritual hardening of these our brethren, that 
is the deadly evil, the burning reproach to 
a Christian civilization." 

How far this is also true of every other large city, 
and by no means infrequent in our country districts, 
those who choose may soon see for themselves. 
Take just one vivid specimen from the recent re- 
port of the lady sanitary inspector at Bradford : — 

" In regard to one back-to-back house con- 
sisting of one bedroom and a kitchen, the in- 
spector states that it was occupied by a mother, 
two adult daughters, a son, and two illegitimate 
children. The whole family were living and 
sleeping in the kitchen, and all sleeping in the 
same bed. The habits of the people were of the 
most depraved description. ... In another 
house there was no bedstead of any kind, the 



NEEDED IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 317 

only bedding being an old straw mattress on 
which slept two parents and seven children, their 
only covering the old clothes worn during the 
day." 

Such an inferno alas, is but typical of myriads more. 
To be appreciated, these have to be put side by side 
with other facts which are equally typical. Mark 
this, for instance, taken from to-day's newspaper : — 

" A well-known furrier remarked to me this 
week : 'I do not remember any winter in which 
more expensive furs were generally worn. 
Coming out of a theatre the other night, I saw 
a lady wearing a sable coat reaching to the hem 
of the dress, which certainly would not have 
cost less than two thousand guineas.' " 

No revival of religion which does not face such 
ghastly extremes as these, and oppose them as 
sternly as Amos or Isaiah would have done, but 
with as much more tenderness for the suffering and 
severity for the selfish as Jesus exemplified, will 
suffice for the coming age. It will assuredly not be 
enough for well-dressed, well-fed, well-housed con- 
gregations to gather and sing their conventional 
" Magnificat " : — 

" The hungry He hath filled with good things, 
But the rich He hath sent empty away " — 

and then treat it with no more practical regard than 
the sentimental ditty of a music hall. The disin- 
herited masses of the people have had far more than 
enough of such verbal mockery. If a truly con- 
verted man is expected after a revival to become a 
living and active member of some Christian Church, 
so must the Church itself become a living and active 
influence in human society. It must put itself to 
pains to count as a definite and potent force on behalf 



318 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST 

of justice, no less than an effective school of charity, or 
a " successful mission " When the " out-of-works " 
in a recent city procession flaunted the banner " Curse 
your charity " — no doubt some fine ladies clad in 
sables were shocked at their rudeness. But if the 
same fine ladies, and gentlemen to match, could but 
be made to change places with the objects of their 
scorn for one twelvemonth, it would not only be a 
wholesome experience for the idle rich, but make 
clear the difference between the justice to which 
every man has right, and the charity of which no 
one should have need. Upon this difference Bishop 
Gore has spoken manful words which plainly 
indicate the kind of revival in the name of religion 
that alone will draw the people to the Churches. 

"The principle of justice is one which is not 
approximately realized in what we call Christian 
society at present. There are comparatively few 
men who have any real opportunity of work 
and remuneration according to their faculties, 
of spiritual knowledge, of legitimate education, 
physical and moral. Until that is secured, 
until the principle of justice is acknowledged 
and acted on, all philanthropic effort which 
teaches contentment, which aims chiefly at the 
maintenance of the established social order, and 
has not for its purpose a permanent moral im- 
provement, is a wrong to the poor and a specious 
anodyne for the consciences of the rich." 

The pious notion which so largely yet prevails, 
that Christian Churches only exist to form folds of 
safety for guileless sheep, is worse than childish. 
The sheep metaphor has been considerably over- 
employed. If taken from Christ's words, it must at 
least include such other sayings of His as these — 
" He who has My commandments and keeps them, 



NEEDED IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 319 

he it is that loves Me". — "Not every one who says 
to Me, Lord, Lord, will enter the Kingdom of Heaven, 
but he who does the will of My Father." 

The fulfilment of this ideal will demand a great 
enlargement of what has hitherto been conceived as 
a revival of religion. For it will mean not merely 
the purification and ennoblement of the individual 
in his personal and domestic relations, which is al- 
ready well understood, but also the clearer appre- 
hension and faithful discharge of all his civic, social, 
commercial, and political responsibilities. Un- 
fortunately, at present, there is sinister agreement 
between believers and unbelievers as to the small- 
ness of this country's right to be called Christian. 
Says the virulent opponentof everything Christian : — 

" I mentally apostrophize the Christian British 
people. 'Ladies and gentlemen,' I say, 'you 
are Christian in name, but I discern little of 
Christ in your ideals, your institutions, or your 
daily lives. If to praise Christ in words and 
deny Him in deeds, be Christianity, then London 
is a Christian city and England is a Christian 
nation. For it is very evident that our common 
English ideals are anti-Christian, and that our 
commercial, foreign, and social affairs are run 
on anti-Christian lines." 1 

Whilst the earnest preacher from the pulpit of St. 
Mary's, Oxford, declares : — 

" We are forced to admit that after nineteen 
hundred years of Christianity, whatever may be 
the case with individuals, society at present is 
certainly not Christian; not Christian in its 
aims and methods; not Christian in its judg- 
ments. There is no more striking instance of 

1 " God and My Neighbour," p. ix. 



320 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST 

this opposition, than the value it sets upon 
riches and poverty." 1 

The revival which is needed throughout the 
Churches is one which will reverse all this, and 
make Great Britain to be a truly Christian nation. 
The Kingdom of Heaven hereafter may be well left 
to the judgement and love of God. Its significance 
is enhanced, not lessened, by so-doing. It is no 
more possible than necessary for us to forecast it in 
detail. Its certain uncertainty is more than enough 
for faith and hope, as well as for solemn warning. 
The establishment of the Kingdom of Heaven here 
on earth, and the consequent leavening of civilization 
with justice and sympathy and brotherly love, is 
the revival needed, if Christianity is to justify its 
claim to be a Gospel to humanity. In addition to 
all the individual penitence and faith and holiness 
which the First great command of Jesus has in view, 
the Second would ensure to Europe and humanity 
what all the "armed peace " of politics and elaborate 
schemes of sociology have failed to accomplish. 

Nation with nation, land with land, 
Unarmed shall live as comrades free, 

In every heart and brain shall throb 
The pulse of one fraternity. 

Man shall love man with heart as pure 

And tender as the Christ of old, 
Instead of feud 'twixt rich and poor, 

Shall each serve all with joy untold. 

New arts shall bloom of loftier mould, 
And mightier music thrill the skies ; 

And every life shall be a song, 
When all the earth is Paradise. 2 



Bampton Lectures for 1907," p. 107. 



1 u 

2 One of the happy signs of the times, from the Christian stand- 
point, is the occurrence of the noble hymn of Mr. Addington 
Symonds in The Methodist Hymn Book, No. 980. A quarter of a 
century ago it would certainly have been excluded. 



NEEDED IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 321 

2. With the above in view, it is abundantly plain 
that another characteristic of the revival that is most 
needed is permanence. It is most common as well as 
true to speak of u a wave " of revival. Therein lies 
quite as much its failure as its measure of success. 
It comes — and goes. Even if it brought all and only 
good, its transience would be fatal to its sufficiency. 
In all that makes for righteousness, alike in an in- 
dividual, a family, a nation, what is needed is not 
transience but permanence. The good is wanted 
not only to come, but to stay. Even if the wave 
became a tide, it would still far from suffice. For 
tides ebb as well as flow ; and the ebb may mean 
more disaster than the flow benediction. The 
parable of the Master hereupon, has had tragic con- 
firmation in the history of men and nations. 1 

The ordinary conception of the need for revival 
is contained in the suggestion of the word itself, as 
a kind of recovery from fainting. But this is not the 
Christian need of the hour. What is required is 
growth, as of a stunted child, rather than the coming 
round of an adult who has lost consciousness. The 
Churches have not fainted ; they are not fainting ; 
they are failing. The failure is not due to such a 
temporary suspension of animation as may be ended 
by a galvanic shock of emotion. It is due to lack of 
development, even as the inability of the Chinese 
woman to walk properly, was brought about not by 
muscular failure but by the prevention of growth. 
It has been said only too truly that the " influence of 
Christianity on mankind at large is and has been 
strangely disproportionate to the reasonable expecta- 
tion of those who saw its beginnings ". The main 
reason is not far to seek. It has been "cribb'd, 
cabined, and confined " by swaddling bands of ecclesi- 

1 " When the evil spirit is gone out of a man, etc." (Matt. xn. 44). 

21 



322 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST 

asticism, Augustinian theology, and popular conven- 
tions, which have prevented its natural and spiritual 
expansion and left it crippled for its great mission to 
humanity. What is wanted now more than ever 
heretofore, is some such word of power as Jesus 
uttered by the grave of Lazarus — " Loose him, and 
let him go ". Growth in mind, growth in heart, 
growth in sympathy, in scope, in effort, are the main 
elements of permanence in any Christian revival 
adequate to the needs of the twentieth century. 

The vast increase in our modern populations 
makes this unmistakable. For as in any family, the 
birth of each child means a prospective addition to 
the happiness or misery of the whole, so does every 
personality added to the census mean either a storm 
centre of evil or a focus of sweetness and light. All 
that is best, or worst, in modern civilisation, emanates 
from human personalities. These, therefore, must 
be affected, if any Golden Age is ever to draw nigh. 
But such moulding of personalities is earth's greatest 
problem. The only certainty that emerges out of 
all the failures of the past, is that for such a purpose 
there is need of a process which is much more 
than, or at least a distinct addition to, any sudden 
shock. Saul did not become Paul through the flash 
from heaven on the Damascus road. The explanation 
of the great transition which proved so permanent, is 
rather found in his own words — " but I went away 
into Arabia, and again I returned to Damascus ". 
So generally ; a revival that is merely an emotional 
beginning, would never have established Christianity 
at the outset. Assuredly to-day, amidst all the fer- 
ment of modern life and the enormous multiplication 
of human activities, no "Pentecost " will avail which is 
not followed, even more than in the first century, by 
corresponding universal, thorough, patient, practical, 
persistent devotion. Lightning flashes may serve 



NEEDED IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 323 

to show the way in the thick darkness of a storm, 
but they will neither ripen the corn nor paint the 
flowers. And as of old the Roman Empire was won 
for Christ, not by the overflowing emotion alone 
which found its sensational vent in the gift of tongues, 
but in the abiding faithfulness of Christian principles 
on the part of genuine believers, even in spite of 
deadliest opposition, 1 so must it be in our modern 
midst. The revival most needed is but little helped 
by Congresses, Conventions, Conferences, Missions, 
and the like ; except so far as these are accompanied 
and followed by broad, practical, thorough-going, 
permanent sympathy. A well-known leader in the 
Evangelical Churches said on a recent public oc- 
casion : — 

11 My judgement is that before we are going to 
have a widespread revival of religion, there will 
have to be a squaring and a settling up of the 
relations between employers and employed ; 
between masters and men. We cannot expect 
sweated people whose governors and pay- 
masters attend a place of worship, to go to a 
similar service, so long as they feel that they do 
not get a fair wage and a due recompense for 
their work." 2 

This witness is true. But the justice and sympathy 
which he has in view as the condition of a revival, 
are even more its abiding consequences when it 
really means, as it ought to do, incandescent devo- 
tion to the Mastership of Jesus Christ. 

3. Another element which is inevitably required 
in any such development of Christianity as will meet 

1 " Christianity won the Empire by that in it which was higher 
and more morally effective than what could be found in other 
faiths."— Dr. Vernon Bartlet. 

2 Rev. F. B. Meyer, at City Road Church, Bristol. 



324 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST 

the needs of the age, is the definite insistence upon 
curative aims and methods, in addition to all the 
palliative efforts now so earnestly adopted. As inti- 
mated above, every Christian Church, and especially 
every one of the great Missions in the cities, is a 
centre of help and healing, a refuge and home for 
the distressed, such as is not, nor ever has been, 
found anywhere else. Yet however much this 
work merits our sympathy and support, it must be 
recognized that at best and utmost it is all merely pal- 
liative. What is wanted is the curative. How many 
of the unemployed, homeless, distressed, forlorn, 
despairing applicants for help, come into their sorry 
plight really through their own sin and folly, cannot 
be told. But it is pitifully safe to say that the majority 
of them do not. Drink, for instance, is the most 
often quoted cause of wretchedness. But Mr. Chas. 
Booth's careful investigations in London showed 
that in the vast number of cases of abject poverty 
which he traced out, only some 13 per cent were due 
to drink, whilst not less than 55 per cent were due 
to unemployment and illness. All too long have 
religious people left these and other such tragic 
causes of human woe, to economists and politicians. 
Even yet there are sincere " spiritual " fanatics who 
would ban their consideration under any religious 
auspices. Sermons especially, we are told, must 
have no reference to social or political matters, be- 
cause this would be a departure from " the evangeli- 
cal simplicity " of the Gospel. Of a truth the 
" Gospel " as preached by some such advocates, has 
been too simple by half. The men around us who 
are so conspicuously absent from the Churches, hold 
aloof because they have failed to find in such simpli- 
city any real good tidings like those which Jesus 
claimed to announce ; or any practical antidote to the 
injustices and oppressions which weigh so heavily 



NEEDED IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 325 

upon the proletariat in modern civilization. The 
deadly Upas tree of social and commercial and civic 
convention, under whose fell branches myriads are 
perishing, has roots, and until the axe of equity and 
brotherhood is laid to these roots, the murderous 
miasma will continue to poison its victims. If there 
be any application at all to Christian ideals and 
promises of the Apocalyptic figure that " the leaves 
of the Tree of Life are for the healing of the nations," 
assuredly never was that application so much needed 
as now. On the part of the true disciple of Jesus 
there can be no hesitation in affirming that any 
revival of religion which does not consecrate its 
devotees to stern conflict against social evils, as 
earnestly as against individual spiritual wrong, must 
be to a lamentable extent a failure. The late Dr. 
Punshon left no one in doubt as to his Evangelical 
sympathies. Yet he anticipated, some forty years 
ago, both the development of social sympathy in 
the Churches and the unmeasured need for it, when 
he wrote : — 

Chivalry's was cruel splendour, 

There are nobler conflicts now ; 
Worthier shrines at which to render 

Manhood's faith and valour's vow. 
Still the trampled nature calleth 

For the valiant heart and hand ; 
Ready whatsoe'er befalleth, 

In the deadly breach to stand. 

When the famine-stricken languish, 

Pining through the hopeless years ; 
Where grim laughter masks an anguish, 

Far more terrible than tears ; 
Where o'er all the fated city, 

Sorrow's ceaseless sable hangs ; 
Where the helpless wail for pity, 

Where the martyrs hide their pangs. 



326 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST 

Christian soldier, rise and arm thee, 

Take the Spirit's sevenfold shield ; 
Let no coward fears alarm thee 

Recreant from this solemn field. 
Fiercer than the fabled giants, 

Are thy foes of want, and crime ; 
God thy helper, men thy clients, 

Haste thee to the strife sublime. 

4. Such a recognition of the need of curative 
measures for social ills in the name of the Christian 
religion, brings with it also a deeper sense than 
ever of the need of individual prevention as well as 
social cure. The mystery of human nature will 
doubtless continue to baffle all attempts at the 
amelioration of society from without, i.e. by means 
of economic schemes and legal powers. No wise 
social reformer dreams of curing all the ills of 
civilization "by dead lift". Human character has 
to be reckoned with, in the last resort. And char- 
acter has to be moulded, seeing that it cannot be 
made. Practically, the only time for such moulding- 
is during youth. That is why the real awakening of 
the Churches to the sense of their responsibilities 
and opportunities, must be such as will put un- 
measured increase of emphasis on the Christian 
training of the young, in all the three necessary 
departments of home, daily school, and Sunday 
school. There is no lack of appreciation of all the 
good at present working through these, when it is 
deliberately affirmed that no one of them is what it 
needs to be for present Christian purposes. 

The notion that children are naturally corrupt, 
and must play the prodigal and be converted before 
they can be sure of Divine Fatherhood, still miser- 
ably holds in some religious circles ; whereas the 
home ought ever to be the sanctuary in which the 
children — whom Paul well calls "holy" from their 



NEEDED IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 327 

birth — may be irreversibly trained in the conscious- 
ness of Christian discipleship. The nation's day 
schools, thanks to clerical bigotry, are becoming in- 
creasingly closed to religious teaching, and there is no 
prospect of any enlightened harmony in this regard. 
Sunday schools, therefore, become more important 
than ever. Nor does any portion of Christian work 
need more the quickening influence of genuine re- 
vival. Not, as already said above, that they are faint- 
ing or falling. But that, to speak generally, they 
sorely need improving and developing. The good 
elements in them, which no one denies, are not nearly 
good enough for the present age, however valuable 
the service which they have thus far rendered. It 
were easy to point out wherein they fail, but such 
detail is not here necessary. In this realm, as in all 
others, the difficulty of wise development lies in the 
cost. But in the course of the genuine revival of 
Christendom, there would be no lack either of 
wisdom to direct or of devotion to energize such 
betterness of method and spirit as would make Sun- 
day schools real nurseries of faith. Only so is there 
any hope of stopping the leakage, which now lament- 
ably prevails, away into the world of Godlessness. 
As curative measures in face of society's ills are 
ever better than palliative, so are preventive better 
than curative. It is quite possible to make too much 
of the mending of " broken earthenware " in Christian 
service. It is immeasurably better to save from 
breaking, than to mend when broken. There may 
not be so much of the sensational, but there is more 
of the really valuable and permanent. The case of the 
prodigal son, we may repeat, has been dangerously 
emphasized. Whether the elder brother was perfect 
or not, is irrelevant. What is wanted 'above all else 
is such a revival of Christ's spirit everywhere, as 
shall fill both homes and churches with young men 



328 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST 

who, modestly yet manfully, can look their truly 
Christian fathers in the face and say each one — 
" These many years do I serve thee, and I never 
yet transgressed a commandment of thine ". 

5. But it is time to ask plainly the question which 
every suggestion as to the true elements of a revival 
makes more imperative, viz. How is such an awaken- 
ing and development to come to pass ? It is here 
that the truth which is most true, is often, amongst 
religious people at all events, least welcome. The 
general attitude is fairly expressed in a verse taken 
from the Acts of the Apostles, as rendered in the 
Old Version, where the Apostles are credited with 
saying :— 

" Repent ye, therefore, and be converted, that 
your sins may be blotted out, when the times of 
refreshing shall come from the presence of the 
Lord." 

The lesson of which undoubtedly is, as so many 
are content to take it, that the needed revival is 
waiting for God to do something special and 
wonderful, and when that happens all will be well. 
The main duty of the Church, in such case, is said 
to be to " wait upon God " ; much in the same way 
as in the same Version the importunate widow is 
represented as waiting upon the unjust judge. It 
is a very pious conception ; but it is pitifully mislead- 
ing. For not only is the rendering in Acts in. 19, 
as inaccurate as the misunderstanding of Luke xvm. 
1-8 is lamentable, but the corresponding inference 
is wholly unwarranted. It is no less mischievous 
and hindering for being supported by popular public 
utterances and occasional lines in hymns. Not long 
since a well-known preacher declared to a large 
audience that the supreme need of the hour was 



NEEDED IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 329 

" simple faith in the omnipotence of God ... in the 
overwhelming power of Christ ". This also is 
exactly what is implied, if only congregations 
thought what they were singing, in the familiar 
lines of an otherwise inspiring hymn of Ebenezer 
Elliott :— 

When wilt Thoti save the people, 
O God of mercy, when ? 

But whether such words are popular and pleasing 
or not, must here be left out of account. They are not 
true. They are indeed doubly worse than untrue. 
For they malign the character of God, no less than 
they underrate the duty and responsibility of man. 
The better rendering of the above passage in the 
Revised Version, clearly show T s what is the great 
lesson to be learned. 

" Repent ye, therefore, and turn again, that 
your sins may be blotted out, that so there may 
come seasons of refreshing from the presence of 
the Lord." 

Here the plain truth looks us in the face, which 
not only saves the Divine character from being put 
upon a level with that of the unjust judge, but re- 
minds us that the whole revival which is included in 
the comprehensive term "seasons of refreshing," is 
not waiting for God at all, but for men. " Repent 
. . . that so there may come." 

The omnipotence of God, in very deed, has nothing 
at all to do with it. In so far as a real revival 
of religion involves moral and spiritual character, 
omnipotence has no application to it. If by sheer 
power God could "save (all) the people," would He 
not at this very hour do so ? With all reverence, 
because all truth, it must be said, that such a line as 
that above quoted, is as cruel towards God as it 



330 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST 

would be to entreat a mother, hanging with heart- 
ache over a fever-smitten child and doing everything 
she knew for its relief, to save her child. It is 
strange that good people do not see that attribution 
of such power to God, however well-meant, is really 
a libel on the love of God. If He could save all the 
people from their sins and follies, and consequent 
sufferings, apart from themselves — i.e. by some 
stroke of omnipotence — and would not, does not, 
He becomes inevitably the infinite monster whom 
J. S. Mill said he would rather go to hell than wor- 
ship. How different was the attitude of Christ 
Himself, His own tearful words bear witness. 
11 How often would I have gathered thy children 
together, as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, 
. . . and ye would not." The helplessness of God in 
face of persistent moral evil may provoke other in- 
quiries, but it is a truth which is not more undeni- 
able in fact than far-reaching in its import towards 
men and women, whether in the Church or out of it. 
The great double truth which follows upon re- 
cognition of all the facts of human nature and the 
main principles of the Gospel of Jesus, is marvel- 
lously under-rated alike by believers and unbelievers. 
It is, first, that in the realm of grace even more 
markedly than in nature, the way of human bene- 
diction is the way of co-operation with the Divine. 
As moral beings, we are so constituted that God 
can no more save any man without himself, than the 
man can save himself without God. Secondly ; in all 
such co-operation, it is always true that the Divine 
part is waiting for the human, not the human wait- 
ing for the Divine. Even in inorganic nature the 
principle holds good. All the conveniences of our 
modern life which have become practical necessities, 
work by laws which have been waiting from pre- 
historic times for man to discover and obey. As 



NEEDED IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 331 

soon as he obeys them, they serve him ; but not one 
moment before. It is an inadequate illustration, but 
a true analogue of what happens in the realm of 
grace. In the spiritual relation of moral beings to 
God, it is even more true that it is He who is always 
waiting for the Churches ; not the Churches for 
Him. 

Indeed both the usual representations of conven- 
tional religion herein are wrong. It is neither true 
that as workers together with Him we have to wait 
until He has done some new marvel ; nor that b}^ 
importunate pleading we have to coerce Him into 
doing what we desire. His part towards human 
benediction is always done ; His best is already 
given ; His utmost is always anticipating ours. If 
there be failure, it is the human not the Divine 
element which is lacking. The more stress is laid 
upon Pentecost by Christian faith, the less warranted 
is any prayer for the "outpouring" of the Spirit. 
When fairly considered, such a phrase, however 
sincere, is as unhelpful as untrue. All that Pente- 
cost signified is perennial. It has never been either 
reversed or diminished. What is needed is the re- 
sponse to the Apostolic word — " Work out your own 
salvation with all your might, for it is God who is 
working in you both to will and to do according to 
His gracious purpose ". 

6. It is thus the human part in the co-operation 
with the Divine, which calls for largest emphasis. 
When it is asked how can such a revival be brought 
about as will not merely save souls — in the fullest 
sense — or add members to the Churches, but 
establish on earth a Kingdom of Heaven which will 
put an end to the tragedies of civilization and make 
life worth living for every man, the answer is an 
application of natural law to the spiritual world. 



332 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST 

The position is virtually the same in religion as in 
science. For the latter, the only ro}*al road of pro- 
gress is by means of three factors : the acquisition 
of knowledge ; its general application to human 
affairs ; and the personal adoption of such applica- 
tion in daily life. So too in the realm of spiritual 
evolution. Any revival which is to bring a genuine 
deepening and strengthening of the hold of Christ's 
Gospel on modern society, must proceed upon three 
definite lines. On these, and upon no other, will 
there be any twentieth century approach towards 
"making the world Christian". These three main 
principles are (i) the clearing and intensifying of 
conviction ; (ii) the development of corresponding 
character ; and (iii) the working out of that character 
in actual effort. Otherwise expressed, it is the 
revival of Christian belief, Christian holiness, 
Christian effort, in all those who are attached to the 
Churches, which alone holds any promise of in- 
creasing potency for modern Christianity. Without 
attempting elaboration, it seems necessary to state 
succinctly what each of these really means. 

(i) Revival in conviction. 

" Diffused Christianity," it may freely be conceded, 
is more in evidence than ever. But so too is 
"spiritual inertia". And the former has but little 
effect upon the latter. The only dynamic sufficient 
to remove spiritual inertia is personal conviction. 
It may be more or less intellectual, but real it must 
be. This, alas ! is precisely what it is not, through- 
out half Christendom. That which brings vast num- 
bers to one religious service on a Sunda} 7 — and often 
next to nothing more — is an indescribable blend of 
personal, family, social, conventional elements, all 
of which put together would only yield a halting 
and superficial answer to Christ's own direct inquiry 
— " Do you believe on the Son of God ? " Christen- 



NEEDED IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 333 

dom to-day is not only broader than ever, but thinner. 
There is not only less impassioned faith, but more 
unspoken doubt. Not that this is either strange or 
necessarily fatal to faith. It would be strange 
indeed if it were otherwise. Modern Christianity 
has to reckon with the far-reaching developments of 
modern science ; the resistless progress of historical 
criticism ; the ever-increasing cheap anti-Christian 
propagandism through the press ; the exhausting 
pressure of competitive business life ; the weary 
monotony or cruel tyranny under which myriads of 
white slaves have yet to toil ; the correlated craving 
for more or less exciting amusements ; the general 
restlessness and ferment of the social and political 
environment. These all, not simply added but 
multiplied together, make a total more unfavourable 
to definite Christian conviction than any age has 
ever yet witnessed since the Christian era dawned. 
So comes it to pass that in this respect the Churches 
are half full of weaklings who scarcely know what 
they believe, and certainly do not know why they 
believe it. 1 Upon which Prof. Seeley's comment is 

1 A paragraph from Mr. Peile's Bampton Lectures puts the case so 
forcefully that it merits special quotation. " Here, I think, we touch 
again upon one at least of the causes of failure we are seeking. If 
I may use a somewhat bold metaphor — which has, if you will think 
of it, a very high authority — the cunning spirit of the world takes the 
ferment which worked such radical changes in the constitution of the 
human soul, and by inoculating Society at large with a very dilute 
and attenuated serum, secures for it a measure of immunity from 
violent and inconvenient attacks. The result is only too familiar to 
us all. In any nation or class where Christianity is an inherited 
habit, or an accepted convention which every one takes as a matter 
of course, the normal religious experience of the individual is a very 
mild and manageable form of the fever which consumed St. Paul, 
and wrung from him the agonized cry — 'wretched man that I am ; 
who will deliver me from this body of death ? ' We find what is 
called average Christianity acting as a protection against enthusiasm, 
a positive obstacle to genuine conversion " (p. 155). 



334 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST 

undeniably warranted — "That the fruits of a Chris- 
tianity so hollow should be poor and sickly, is not 
surprising". 1 

Christianity, to deserve the name, must rest upon 
a rock, even as Jesus Himself said. Furthermore 
it would be useless that the Church should be built 
upon a rock, if the rock itself were only poised in air. 
Certain modern critical vapourings as to whether 
the Christ of the Gospels ever existed, would be 
fatal indeed to Christianity, if there were any sub- 
stance in them. Happily, there is not. They will go 
the way of the Tubingen school which troubled 
the Christian peace of the mid-nineteenth century. 
But leaving this vagary out of account, there are 
many and ffeal changes in Christian doctrine which 
are simply inevitable. In regard to these we are 
at present in the transition state which involves 
difficulty, if not uncertainty, for preachers, and un- 
certainty, if not unbelief, for their hearers. Hence 
comes the feebleness of conviction, based upon the 
lack of understanding, which is one principal cause 
of the apparent failure of present-day Christianity. 
Here, then, must begin the needed revival of real 
religion. Taking Christendom as a whole, there is 
no greater need in these days than the definite form- 
ing, or firm renewing, of such a personal conviction 
as Luke sought to bring about in the mind of Theo- 
philus — " that thou mightest know the certainty con- 
cerning the things wherein thou wast instructed ". 

" Certainty " here means, and need only mean, 
general reliability. A wide margin may be left to 
theological variation without impairing the reality, 
the significance, the unique impressiveness of the 
Christ of the Gospels, and the main principles of 
Apostolic teaching. " Personal," in this connexion 
has a twofold meaning. Conviction needs to be 

1 " Ecce Homo," cheap edition, p. 59. 



NEEDED IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 335 

personal, as distinct from the nebulous aggregate 
belief which is assumed on the part of a congrega- 
tion. Whether the creed be recited or not, it is one 
thing to intone " Our Father which art in Heaven " — 
and another thing to say, with any approach to truth- 
fulness, " I believe in God the Father Almighty ". 
In another sense also conviction must be personal. 
To be conviction at all, it must be distinguished from 
all religious notions, or half beliefs, which have been 
obtained second-hand, borrowed, copied, echoed from 
other sources, parental, friendly or social. As living 
and influential religion in any Church, can only arise 
from the conjoined devotion of real Christians 
who are living units of force, not worthless ciphers ; 
so can such real Christians only be grown upon 
downright personal conviction. 

For this conviction there must as surely be an 
intelligent and rational basis, whatever becomes of 
emotion, as there must be a solid lime-ball for the 
brilliance of the incandescent lime-light. Emotional 
religion without foundation in fact and guidance by 
reason, may easily result in mere fanatic and foolish 
frenzy, as history has shown lamentably enough. 
Religious experience, to be anything better than a 
castle in the air, must emanate from convictions which 
are rock-based on actual fact and rational inference. 
Here, as Jesus Himself and the Apostles never failed 
to insist, must be at least the beginning of the truly 
Christian life. Nor is anything more needed, or 
truly so much needed, in modern Christendom, as 
the formation or renewal of the modest but firm 
conviction which can unhesitatingly declare to 
all concerned — "I know Him whom I believed". 
Without this, a revival will be but the noisy flash of 
a rocket, rather than the rising of the sun. 

(ii) Equally great and inseparable from the fore- 
going, is the present need of revival in genuine 
Christian character. That which men really believe 



336 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST 

they act upon. From half-belief naturally results 
the half-character which is the most serious source 
of leakage and loss in Christendom. An imperfect 
or inconsistent Christian is doubtless a Christian 
still ; even as an invalid is certainly human. But 
how much work does an invalid do ? And how 
much influence does the Church member or adherent 
with a half-Christian character wield, in the modern 
fight for righteousness ? A wholly sympathetic 
observer has described the present situation thus : — 

"The workman observes that the Christian 
employer who in his private life is prominent 
in religious and even philanthropic activities, is 
to him just as hard and exacting as the man 
who professes no belief ; and he is being taught 
also to observe that the Church has for many 
years opposed every reform which has benefited 
the mass of the population ; and looked coldly 
on efforts outside legislation to improve the 
condition of the labouring class, such as the 
temperance movement ; neglecting and thwart- 
ing them in their earlier stages, and only 
patronizing and exploiting them when they 
have established themselves without its aid." . . . 

This view could be only too easily substantiated 
from the record of events in this country during the 
last century. Excepting the noble efforts made by 
F. D. Maurice, Chas. Kingsley, Tom Hughes and 
the "Christian Socialists," what did Christian 
Churches, as such, do for the practical "salvation" 
of the people? 

But it may be asked, is not Christian character 
to-day on the whole good ? And the answer is, Yes ; 
— but not good enough. It is on the whole better 
than it has ever been. But that is largely irrelevant. 
For Christianity and the Churches are not in the 
world to make men good, but, as we have seen in 



NEEDED IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 337 

the preceding section, to make men extra good, i.e. 
holy. 

There can be no manner of doubt that it was this 
extra goodness, this " higher-toned " character, which 
gave early Christianity its victories. Its essential 
features are well expressed in the ancient letter to 
Diognetus, and the apology of Athenagoras. 

Says the former, concerning his fellow Christians 
of that time : — 

" They obey the established laws and they sur- 
pass the laws in their own lives. They love 
all men, though they are persecuted by all. 
They are reviled and they bless ; they are 
insulted and they show respect ; what the soul 
is in the body, this the Christians are in the 
world. Dost thou not see them being thrown 
to wild beasts that they may deny the Lord, 
and yet they are not overcome ? These look 
not like the works of man : they are the proof 
of His presence." 

And Athenagoras writes : — ■ 

" Among us you will find uneducated persons 
and artisans and old women, who if they are 
unable to prove in words the benefit of our 
doctrine, yet by their deeds they exhibit the 
benefit arising from their persuasion of its 
truth. They do not rehearse speeches, but 
exhibit good works ; when struck, they do not 
strike again ; when robbed, they do not go to 
law ; they give to those who ask of them ; and 
love their neighbours as themselves." 

Or listen again, for a moment, to Justin Martyr : — 

" We who formerly hated and destroyed one 
another and on account of their different 
manners would not use a common hearth and 
22 



338 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST 

fire with men of a different tribe, now, since the 
coming of Christ, live familiarly with them, and 
pray for our enemies, and endeavour to persuade 
those who hate us unjustly to live conformably 
to the good precepts of Jesus Christ, so that 
they may become partakers with us of the same 
joyful hope of a reward from God the Ruler of 
all." 

Where, one is driven to ask, is the counterpart 
of this in our midst ? It is presented on the stage 
sometimes even more effectively than in pulpits. 
But is " The passing of the third floor back " re- 
enacted in modern actual church life ? We know 
that it is not. It is to be feared that Prof. Seeley 
was wrong when he added, after the sentence quoted 
above in regard to the existence of the higher-toned 
goodness — "Few will maintain that it has been ex- 
ceedingly rare ". Alas ! it is just that which many 
do now maintain ; and, in simple honesty it must be 
admitted, with much truth. But about one thing 
there is no possibility of mistake. Be the Churches 
many or few ; rich or poor ; established or unestab- 
lished ; Ritualistic or Puritanical ; it is character 
that tells. The multiplication of costly buildings and 
erection of colossal structures at which crowds may 
gape, are, after all, trifles compared with the in- 
fluence of character. It is and it will be, let come 
what may come, with the servants as with their 
Lord. Jesus conquered the world by character ; 
and by the unique goodness and potency of that 
character He yet rules the hearts of men, as utterly 
as Napoleon and Lecky confessed. 

It is the application of this principle of regeneration 
by character, which alone can save modern civiliza- 
tion from becoming a mixture of Armageddon and 
Pandemonium. This, nothing less, and nothing else, 



NEEDED IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 339 

is the ultimate mission of Christianity. Conven- 
tional religion may drag on, by sheer force of the 
human instinct for worship. But it will never be 
the salt of the earth or the light of the world. The 
Christianity which does not produce the noblest 
character on earth, is an everlasting failure. The 
true Christian is the incarnation in personal charac- 
ter of the Apostolic summary : — 

" Finally brethren, whatever things are true, 
whatever things are honourable, whatever 
things are just, whatever things are pure, what- 
ever things are of good repute — if there be 
anything noble or praiseworthy, dwell upon 
these things." 

But is it so, that the name of "Christian" is a synonym 
for all these? Or does the fruit of the Spirit, as 
the same Apostle described it to the Galatians, abound 
in every Christian home, or every Christian Church ? 
Is it a libel, or a true indictment, when the modern 
opponent so loudly declares that Christianity does 
not make men lead better lives than others lead who 
are not Christians ? Let us hope it is a libel ; for 
if it were true, the vocation of Christianity would 
be gone. Whatever therefore may become of Con- 
ventions, Congresses, Missions, Mass meetings and 
the like, the only revival which is worth hoping for, 
or praying for, from the Christian standpoint, is 
that which will cause the average Christian char- 
acter to exceed in all goodness the non-Christian, 
as truly as the light of noon exceeds the grey of 
the dawn or the dusk of the evening. 

(iii) One special feature of such a revival demands 
separate notice. All noble character will find more 
or less expression in action. True, the influence of 
noble character is often actionless. As Seeley put 
it, the man who is Christian indeed exhibits a 



340 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST 

"character of such elevation that his mere presence 
has shamed the bad and made the good better, and 
has been felt at times like the presence of God Him- 
self ". But in a world like this, something more than 
the " mere presence " is often absolutely necessary. 
Facta, non verba, is the only sufficient maxim for 
the carrying out of Christian purpose in the complex- 
ities of daily life. Cardinal Newman was well 
warranted when he wrote — 

Faith's meanest deed more favour bears, 
Where hearts and wills are weighed ; 

Than highest transports, choicest prayers, 
Which bloom their hour and fade. 

Nothing can becloud the plainness of Christ's 
own doctrine hereupon. " Inasmuch as ye have 
not done it unto one of the least of these My 
brethren, ye have not done it unto Me " — are strong 
words which find their echo on every page of the 
New Testament. But in the Churches, up to the 
present time, the actual work of all kinds is done by 
the few, not by the many. Physicists tell us that 
after all the cost and risk and loss of life incurred in 
getting coal from dreary mines, we only utilize 
about one-tenth of the heat energy that it contains. 
Which is tragedy enough, considering all the horror 
and suffering which attach to colliery accidents. 
But it is an equal spiritual tragedy — if half what is 
sung in hymns about the Cross be true — that not 
one-tenth of the real potentiality of the Christian 
Church for the blessing of humanity is being em- 
ployed. It is not too much to say that every Church 
in the land could be more than filled, if avowed Chris- 
tians really wished it. Prolonged discussions have 
been held at times as to the conditions of Church mem- 
bership. But if the New Testament is to count for 
anything, the best and only sufficient test of Christian 
membership is service. In regard to the body, Paul 



NEEDED IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 341 

spoke out plainly — "If any man will not work, 
neither let him eat ". In the realm of the higher 
life the corresponding principle should hold good — 
"if any man will not serve, neither let him count". 
There is no more room for easy-going do-nothings 
in Christian Churches, than for marionettes in a 
regiment of soldiers. The revival, therefore, for 
which Church and world are waiting, is one which 
will cause every man and woman who bears the 
Christian name, to do his or her best and utmost in 
actual service. We are frequently told that such 
and such events constitute " a call to prayer ". It is 
often much more true that it is a call to work that 
is indicated. There may just as well be too much 
prayer as too little. There is no truer line in any 
hymn than one which affirms that 

Work shall be prayer, if all be wrought 
As Thou would 'st have it done. 

Praying, wishing, singing, preaching, talking, may 
all have their valuable function in helping the 
Kingdom of Heaven to come in modern Europe. 
But come it never will, unless these also take shape 
in the actual doing of what duty demands or philan- 
thropy suggests. Emotion without effort leads 
only to a mirage. The revival most needed is that 
which will put greatest stress upon the Master's 
unequivocal utterances — " If any man will do His 
will, he shall know". — "Whosoever shall do and 
teach, the same shall be called great in the kingdom 
of God ". 

7. When all that the greatly-needed awakening 
and developing of modern Christianity involves is 
pondered, the question cannot but arise "Who is 
sufficient for these things ? " It is more than pos- 
sible that one may be asked what is the use of putting 



342 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST 

forth such a counsel of perfection as cannot be at- 
tained ? The answer to which may be at once simple 
and direct. In all that is here suggested as the cry- 
ing need of modern Christianity, there is no counsel 
of perfection ; nor is there anything at all unattain- 
able. The Christian Church can have such a revival 
whenever it chooses. The only hindrance is the 
cost. That is confessedly inevitable. Yet it is but 
the modern form of the Cross without which Jesus 
declared His discipleship to be impossible. Thought- 
ful study of the foundations of faith, especially in the 
fierce light of modern criticism, is certainly much 
more costly than just coming to services where every- 
thing Christian is assumed without question. Self- 
restraint from evil, self-denial in luxurious opportun- 
ity, self-mastery in face of passionate temptation, 
are much more costly than mere attendance at a 
popular mission. Downright personal decision and 
maintained resolution for the highest, in deed, as 
well as word, are immeasurably more costly than 
nominal Church membership, or even official position 
in a Christian Church. But along such a rugged 
path, and nowhere else, lies the road to reality. As 
for— 

11 The idea that religion is a separate and in- 
termittent activity, confined to its own times 
and places, claiming at most one part of our life 
and leaving the rest to other activities in which 
it has no share, and the idea that it is a method 
of escaping deserved punishment by the use of 
prescribed formulas and ceremonies — 

our gentle yet fearlessly-outspoken Lecturer rightly 
calls these " superstitions," and adds, as the greatest 
and most needed lesson for modern Christendom— 

" Real Christianity has nothing in common 
with them ; it is not accommodating or indulgent ; 



NEEDED IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 343 

it will not wait upon our leisure, or condone our 
pleasant vices : but inexorably demands the 
whole of our being, emotion, will, and intellect ; 
the whole of our life, thought, speech, action ; 
and thereby declares itself a revolutionary force ; 
so revolutionary that it can afford to leave 
human institutions unaltered for the moment." 

All this, it will be observed, shows, as above in- 
sisted, how the Divine waits for the human. Such 
a demand as real Christianity makes, is not contin- 
gent upon the love of God, but upon man's response 
to that love. The revival for want of which Chris- 
tianity languishes, is not lingering for want of fresh 
revelations of Divine truth and grace, but by reason 
of the poor appreciation and half-hearted reciproca- 
tion of what is already avowedly known. This is 
at once the explanation of Christianity's comparative 
failure in the past, and the measure of the hope of 
its larger triumph for the future. 

That is why all suggestions relative to a " Se- 
cond Coming of Christ " which imply some sudden 
celestial outburst are delusive and mischievous ; 
however sincerely founded upon particular " pass- 
ages " of Scripture. The only Millennium worth 
thinking about from the Christian standpoint, is 
such as will naturally result from a real and thorough 
awakening of the Christian Church to its own 
privileges, duties, powers, and responsibilities. That 
awakening cannot come to pass by Divine decree, or 
be rushed by Omnipotence. Its essence is the 
genuine response of moral beings to high and noble 
appeal. Appeal is the nearest approach to com- 
pulsion that can be applied to a moral being. That 
is why the last two thousand years have witnessed 
so imperfect a leavening of human hearts, cities, and 
nations, by the doctrine and example of Jesus Christ. 



344 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST 

It has always been possible for human beings, both 
within and without the Church, to say — " we will not 
have this Man to reign over us " It must always 
be so ; whilst man remains man. Progress in the 
spiritual realm, like that in the realm of nature, is by 
evolution not revolution. The sudden jutting up of 
some volcanic island in mid ocean, is but a trifle, 
compared with the slow but sure and resistless 
upheaval of continents which is ever being indicated 
by the gradual but unmistakable alterations in our 
coast line. So too is the real amelioration of human 
society, the purification and ennoblement of civiliza- 
tion, rather a work of centuries than of ten days' 
missions. It is, after all, more dependent upon the 
little than the great ; even as the peace and safety 
which obtain within the coral atoll, are the result 
not of any volcanic eruption but of the ceaseless 
tiny labours of millions upon millions of infinitesimal 
workers. 

Mr. Hall Caine has said that " Socialism is Chris- 
tianity in a hurry ". As a suggestion prompted by 
the crying need of social reform, it may stand. 
But as a fact, it is untrue. For real Christianity is 
never in a hurry. It has no need to be. It cannot 
be. The leaven must have time to work. No 
hammers can expedite it. No blast of trumpets can 
increase its vital force. Jesus Himself showed no 
sign of haste. Nor need His followers, if only they 
were true to Him. The old Evangelical cry about 
11 snatching poor souls out of the fire " — was a crude 
figure taken from a narrow theology, not a true 
statement of the commission given to the Churches. 
The appeal from character to character will always 
tell, is always telling; but in its own way, and at 
its own pace. Its apparent slowness is the measure 
of its sureness. Spiritual character, whether in a 
man, or a church, or a nation, must have time to 



NEEDED IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 345 

gather momentum. But when that is reached, it is 
the mightiest power that makes for righteousness 
in this human world. 

8. If it be deemed at all discouraging thus to 
recognize the inevitable cost and slowness of the 
only revival which is adequate to the need of modern 
Christianity, there is also plenty of reason for en- 
couragement, when the heart of the matter is reached. 
For, as Prof. Rauschenbusch has well said : — 

" The kingdom of God is always coming. 
But every approximation to it is worth while. 
Every step towards personal purity and peace, 
though it only makes the consciousness of 
imperfection more poignant, carries its own ex- 
ceeding great reward, and everlasting pilgrim- 
age towards the kingdom of God is far better 
than contented stability in the tents of wicked- 
ness." 1 

If human progress by evolution seems depress- 
ingly tardier than by revolution, it has at least this 
most comforting and inspiring advantage, that there- 
in every one counts. From the invaluable work just 
quoted, let us listen to yet another sentence which 
deserves to be writ large in letters of gold : — 

"The greatest contribution which any man 
can make to the social movement — i.e. to the 
Kingdom of Heaven upon earth — is the contribu- 
tion of a regenerated personality, of a will which 
sets justice above policy and profit, and of an 
intellect emancipated from falsehood. Such 
a man will in some measure incarnate the prin- 

1 " Christianity and the Social Crisis," p. 421. A work which 
richly merits the careful study of every thoughtful Christian. As a 
summary of the present situation, on Christian lines, it cannot be 
surpassed. 

22 * 



346 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST 

ciples of a higher social order in his attitude to 
all questions, and in all his relations to men, and 
will be a well-spring of regenerating influences." 1 

Perhaps no words whatever can better express 
the mainspring of inspiration which inheres in re- 
vival by spiritual evolution, than those uttered by 
Jesus Himself in connexion with His rebuke of the 
narrowness of John's conception of helpful service : — 

"He that is not against us is for us. For 
whosoever shall give you a cup of water to 
drink because you belong to Christ, I solemnly 
tell you that he will certainly not lose his re- 
ward." 2 

It is to be feared that the real significance and un- 
measured stimulus of these words have too often been 
lost by unwarranted postponement. They have no 
reference to what shall be hereafter ; but put vivid 
emphasis upon what even here and now attaches to 
every effort which involves the utmost for the high- 
est. Nothing indeed can exceed the comfort of such 
assurance, when justice is done to its double mean- 
ing. The very least service here becomes the 
ground of the very highest encouragement. What 
can be less, so far as earth's measurements are 
concerned, than this "cup of water" — which is, of 
course, merely a figure of speech adapted to a drier, 
hotter clime than ours. It really stands for any 
little homely, kindly act. This will vary in form 
according to circumstances, but in heart will simply 
mean such love and sympathy as are always possible 
to the weakest and poorest. 

But the present reward is as great as sure. It is 
no less than the consciousness of helping God. God 
who cannot compel human nature into the com- 
munion for which His love yearns, can be helped in 

1 p. 351. 2 Mark ix. 41. 



NEEDED IN MODERN CHRISTENDOM? 347 

His great purpose towards mankind, by character 
even in the smallest degree like Himself. One of 
the very best statements of this Divine principle 
comes from a most unlikely source. John Stuart 
Mill was well known as a man of powerful intellect, 
and strongly opposed to most Christian beliefs and 
sanctions. He sought to justify his attitude in 
"Three Essays on Religion," of which the last, on 
Theism, is most pronounced in its departure from 
"orthodoxy ". Yet strange to say, at the conclusion 
of that very essay, we find this remarkable deliver- 
ance in regard to what he terms the future "re- 
ligion of humanity ". 

" To the other inducements for cultivating a 
religious devotion to the welfare of our fellow- 
creatures as an obligatory limit to every selfish 
aim, and an end for the direct promotion of 
which no sacrifice can be too great, it super- 
adds the feeling that in making this the rule of 
our life we may be co-operating with the unseen 
Being to whom we owe all that is enjoyable in 
life. One elevated feeling this form of religious 
idea admits of, is the feeling of helping God — of 
requiting the good He has given, by a voluntary 
co-operation which He, not being omnipotent, 
really needs, and by which a somewhat nearer 
approach may be made to the fulfilment of His 
purposes. To do something during life, on 
even the humblest scale, if nothing more is 
within reach, towards bringing this consum- 
mation ever so little nearer, is the most animat- 
ing and invigorating thought which can inspire 
a human creature ; and that it is destined, with or 
without supernatural sanctions, to be the religion 
of the future, I cannot entertain a doubt." 

The Christian believer need not be troubled by 
the giving up of Divine omnipotence in this connec- 



348 WHAT IS THE REVIVAL MOST NEEDED ? 

tion ; for it is perfectly true when applied to moral 
beings, as above intimated. God does need human 
help in a human environment, because we are men 
and not marionettes. Neither men nor marionettes 
can be made to love. But the difference between 
them is as immeasurable as significant. In the 
latter case it is absolutely hopeless, for there is no 
love capacity in a thing. But in the former it is 
more than hopeful, for no one can say when and 
how love may beget love in a person — where love 
is always possible. When all is said and done, the 
glowing words of the Apostle recur with never- 
failing force — "Now abide faith, hope, love, these 
three, and the greatest of these is love ". 

In shortest possible 1 phrase, the revival most of 
all now needed, is the revival of the knowledge of the 
love of God as revealed to men in Jesus Christ. 
There are many hindrances, complications, diffi- 
culties, but the one and only panacea for them all is 
love. He who loves most, helps God most. Nor can 
there be in any heart that has learnt anything of 
Jesus Christ, a more real, abiding, sufficient inspira- 
tion and reward, than to know that in the least act 
of loving service he is contributing to the moral 
and spiritual evolution which is ultimately the only 
hope of civilization ; and that in so doing he is actu- 
ally helping God to fulfil His highest and tenderest 
purposes towards humanity. He who daily lives and 
labours with that truth throbbing in his soul, will 
know, as no verbal exposition could ever teach him, 
what Jesus meant when He said — " He who follows 
me shall not walk in the darkness, but shall have 
the light of life ; " and will enter unspeakably into 
the experience of John when he wrote — " This is the 
victory that overcomes the world, even our faith." 

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